Product Insights for Emerging Technology

20 years in emerging tech — ex-Head of Product at Palantir, now founder of two ventures.

At Common Sense, we’re building modern agentic AI systems for local government — 100x increases in productivity across critical workflows that simplify civil service and delight citizens.

At First Principles, we help emerging tech companies generate massive value, ship faster, align teams, and unlock product-market fit or hypergrowth — through fractional product leadership and expert product coaching.

Whether it serves 10,000 users or 10 million residents, the system has to work — and keep working.

Sound like I can help you? Get in touch:

adam@firstprinciples.la or adam@commonsensetech.ai

Adam Judelson

The U.S. hasn’t had a balanced budget in 25 years.

Every administration since Clinton has overspent – not because taxes are too low, but because government systems are too inefficient.

Obama tried to fix it with the U.S. Digital Service. They saved HealthCare.gov and proved world-class engineers can make government work. But USDS was too small and its remit too limited to tackle the structural waste driving deficits.

This year, Trump and Elon Musk rebranded it as the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). The mandate: cut $1B a day. Agencies were slashed, programs shut down, costs trimmed. But broken software and processes stayed in place – and when systems are broken, the costs always come creeping back in.

Both efforts failed for different reasons:

– USDS lacked breadth, urgency, and proactivity
– DOGE lacked precision, patience, and long-term vision.

That’s the gap we’re filling with Common Sense.

We work outside government, so we can move fast. But we go deep into the plumbing – the legacy systems, the paperwork, the IT that wastes billions and frustrates citizens.

Urgent enough to matter.

Precise enough to actually work.

Building Common Sense (govtech) | Founder, First Principles | Product Insights for Emerging Tech | Ex-Palantir | 4x Venture-Backed Exec

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Matt Swain

LinkedIn for Founders & Execs

I’ve built my career as a creator, thought-leader, author and entrepreneur who helps executives and founders evolve their online presence into genuine influence. I’ve had the privilege of working with global icons such as Wim Hof, Steven Bartlett and Arthur Brooks, and collaborated directly with LinkedIn to shape the conversation around digital content, executive-led brands and how social influence can drive commercial growth.

At the start of 2024, I founded Triangle Branding, an exclusive B2B thought leadership agency built for category-leading founders and CEOs who want to turn their ideas into influence. We help them build human-led digital reputations by using their own personal voice to drive commercial impact through LinkedIn-first content, strategic storytelling and demand-generation systems. 

Over the last 18 months, we’ve helped clients raise over $100M, land deals with companies such as Sony, Nvidia and Virgin, had 100 million eyeballs on clients’ content and generate meaningful inbound opportunities by building executive-led brands that people trust.

www.triangle-branding.com

Founder of SOCIAL CLUB

Founder and Manager of SOCIAL CLUB - an exclusive social media community where members manage over 328 million followers. 

If you're an influencer or brand who wants to connect please get in touch. 
If you're interested in investing/sponsoring/collaborating please email on matt@mattswain.co.uk

4 years ago on a random Wednesday morning I hit post on LinkedIn. 

It's been a wild ride since: 

– Publishing my first book
– Winning clients, losing clients
– Hitting record-breaking months
– Speaking on international stages
– Travelling & working across continents 
– Hiring my first team member (then my tenth)
– Waking up to emails from Fortune 500 brands
– Heaps of self-doubt, rejection and imposter syndrome
– Working with Wim Hof, Arthur Brooks, and Steven Bartlett

When I set out on this journey, I focused on followers, impressions, metrics - they mattered. 

But as you grow, you forget all about those, and start to focus on how posting online opens up business, friendships, opportunities - the things the numbers can't capture. 

So while hitting 50,000 followers should feel like a milestone - it doesn't. 

Because I've come to realise, it's not about the audience. It’s about the projects, conversations, people, opportunities, connections, meaning and growth that comes with it.

500 to 50,000 followers - my takeaway 

I was invited by LinkedIn to attend B2Believe, and the message was clear:

B2B is shifting faster than most teams realise. Creativity, buyer confidence, and human connection are becoming the new growth levers.

Here are my 7 core takeaways (share & save this!) 

1. Creativity is becoming the language of B2B

Creative that grabs and holds attention multiplies leads by 3x. But while 92% say consistent creative matters – only 12% deliver it. 

49% B2B decision-makers say they’re more likely to explore a company if its advertising is creative

40% B2B decision-makers say they’d be more likely to consider a purchase if the ad is seen as “creative”


2. Millennials + Gen Z now make up 71% of B2B buyers 

You need to engage them differently – they respond to: Cultural references; human stories; faces, not logos. 

87% of B2B buyers now prefer content from trusted industry influencers over brand-authored content.


3. Buyability: the new model for growth

B2B buying is slow because buyers don’t feel safe with 64% of marketers saying decisions now take longer. 

The top job-to-be-done is: “Can I defend this decision if it goes wrong?”

Buyers don’t need more information — they need more confidence.


4. Your network is a marketing asset — not a distribution channel

When employees from your target accounts follow your company, you generate 2.4x more leads.

And when senior decision-makers at those target accounts are connected to your employees, that jumps to 2.2x more leads.

You are more than 20x more likely to be bought when everyone in the Buyer Group knows you on Day One. Build brand, trust & authority with the right people. 


5. Video is non-negotiable

Jonathon Palmer said it well: Sound, movement, and visual cues trigger far stronger memory formation than static content ever can.

It generates 1.4x more engagement, meaning more people stop, watch, and interact.

And most importantly: viewers retain 95% of the message when it’s delivered via video.

+20% more leads are driven with video

Attention is scarce and recall is even scarcer. Video gives you the highest chance of being remembered — and being acted on.


6. Employee content > corporate content

B2B is shifting from logos to faces; from corporate statements to human voices.

Even when only 3% of employees post regularly, companies drive 20% more leads.

So bring your team to the forefront. 


7. Brand and demand are no longer separate

Everything now all comes down to trust, Tunji Akintokun put it: “In B2B, trust is the ultimate growth metric that closes deals.”

The era of “brand OR performance” is finished. Full-funnel integration is now a growth multiplier with always-on brand activity showing +10% conversion lift. 


In summary: 

The brands that win in 2025 won’t be the ones who look good in reports — they’ll be the ones who move buyer groups to act.

In partnership with LinkedIn for Marketing #Ad

He has 2,100 followers and averages 5 likes a post. Yet books in calls with Nvidia, HP & Shell. True story of one of my clients: 

His LinkedIn presence books monthly new business development opportunities with $10m annual contract value. 

Yet, we don't follow any of the "hacks" or "templated content" or "automated outreach" approaches that go viral on here. Because if you're selling to high-value decision makers with 7-figure deals, they won't work. 

Our process at Triangle starts long before the post goes live. We study how your ideal buyers think – their pressures, quarterly goals, decision frameworks, and what creates credibility in their world. And build an authority-building content strategy and human-touch DM messaging plan around that. 

If you're just hoping that hitting post and sending a few random connects is enough – it's not. If you want to reach your long-term demand-generation goals with LinkedIn – you need a nuanced, custom approach based on your business, target persona and wider marketing strategy. 

LinkedIn can open doors to 7-figure opportunities – but only if you stop playing the same game as everyone else.

10 shocking stats you need to know about the Creator Economy:

(1) Nearly 1 in 3 creators launched a product, agency or SaaS tool in 2025 – the line between creator and entrepreneur is gone.

(2) HubSpot now allocates 10% of its influencer budget to LinkedIn, while Notion will spend 40–45% here by end of 2025. LinkedIn is the place to be for B2B creators. 

(3) The creator economy will grow from $191B in 2025 to $528B by 2030 – a 22.5% CAGR. The “creator economy” is no longer a niche – it’s the next great economic sector built on individual IP.

(4) Unilever will allocate half of its entire marketing budget on socials by the end of 2025. Legacy brands are admitting what startups already knew – creators are the new media channels.

(5) 1 in 5 social media users now identify as a creator – everyone’s a broadcaster now.

(6) Knowledge creators (educators, founders, consultants) earn 3x more than lifestyle creators with the same audience size. Depth beats aesthetics – audiences are craving insight, not aspiration. 

(7) The average enterprise spends $1.7M/year on creator collaborations, up 40% since 2022. Creator partnerships have gone from “test campaigns” to core marketing channels. 

(8) 91% of creators now use AI tools as part of their workflow – AI has turned solo creators into full production teams.

(9) Courses, newsletters and podcasts, known as the knowledge creator stack, are now the fastest-growing revenue channels in the creator economy. Creators are moving from ad-driven to IP-driven models. The goal isn’t virality – it’s ownership.

(10) 82% of consumers say they trust creators more than brand ads. In an era of AI-generated everything, human credibility is the ultimate growth moat.

The Creator Economy is only going in one direction – up! 

And with the rise of knowledge creators, LinkedIn is a core platform marking a new era where expertise outperforms entertainment.

Jae Oh flew in from San Francisco for B2Believe, and LinkedIn asked me to sit down with him to kick off their new series, #B2BOverBevies. Jae leads measurement at LinkedIn, and he’s one of the few people who actually sees how B2B performance, intent, and ROI play out in reality on the platform. 

We talked about the myths holding teams back: why ROAS is often misunderstood, why intent now matters as much as conversion, why incrementality reveals what dashboards hide, and the difference between confidence & clarity for marketers.  

Conversation dropping soon! 👀

2 weeks ago, we got introduced to a Harvard Professor. We've been working with one of their colleagues and generated 4.5 million views in the last 90 days and grew their audience by 19,500 followers. 

We sat down with this new professor and talked about what they’re trying to achieve over the next 6 months. 

They have a book launching with Penguin in 2026 & want a channel to drive speaking and corporate training bookings. And they want a brand that does justice to 20+ years of academic research, depth of thinking, and nuance in their ideas – this is what we do best. 

We built an action plan and walked through our strategy, our process and a bunch of initial ideas. 

They loved it & signed contracts 2 days later. 

We kicked off yesterday with our Deep Dive session where we: 

(1) Codified his Intellectual Property – So he can own a clear space in his market — anchored in his strongest ideas, opinions, and niche-defining frameworks.

(2) Mapped his Story Arcs – Extracting the pivotal moments, transformations, and turning points that make his journey memorable, relatable, and worth following.

(3) Distilled his Core Messaging Pillars – Clarifying the 3–5 themes he’ll become known for — so every post, story, and idea reinforces a consistent, recognisable brand.

I get asked about the best thing about Triangle – and my answer is always the same – our client base is incredible. 

Week after week, we get to partner with world-class thinkers, operators, founders, professors, economists, and industry leaders who are shaping the conversation in their fields.

Taking their brilliance and building the systems, stories, and positioning that make the world take notice.

10 unpopular opinions about LinkedIn that I'll stand by:

1. Your "thought leadership" post with zero original thought is just noise. If ChatGPT could write it, why are you?

2. Posting 3x a week without strategy is worse than not posting at all. You're training your audience to ignore you.

3. 2,100 followers who buy from you beats 100k who scroll past you. I've seen clients book calls with Nvidia, HP & Shell averaging just 5 likes per post.

4. Stop chasing viral templates. Lean into your unique advantage, core IP, and the expertise only you can deliver. That's what creates category ownership.

5. Your company page isn't going to drive results. Faces drive 10x more engagement than logos - bring YOU to the forefront. 

6. "Building in public" only works if you're actually building something and sharing your lessons from the trenches. Your morning coffee routine isn't a founder story. 

7. Most founders spend 5 hours writing one post. We get 10 posts from 1 hour of conversation. You don't need more time – you need better systems.

8. Millennials and Gen Z make up 71% of B2B buyers. If you're still writing like it's 2015, you're speaking to an audience that's already left.

9. Your audience doesn't need more information. They need confidence to make decisions. Stop educating, start reassuring.

10. LinkedIn isn't a content platform. It's a trust-building platform. If you're not increasing buyer confidence, you're doing it wrong. 

--

B2B buying is slow because buyers don't feel safe. 

Their top question isn't "Does this work?" – 
It's "Can I defend this decision if it goes wrong?"

Every post should build confidence, not just awareness.

If you still think LinkedIn is “just a place to post” – think again.

Because the results we’re generating for clients right now — from Harvard professors to £100M founders – show a completely different reality.

A reality where content isn’t vanity… it’s pipeline, authority, and multi-seven-figure opportunities.

Some of our results: 

Client A – Director, Co-working Space (London)

Goal: Increase visibility, attract inbound demand, and build a steady flow of MQLs.

Result:
- 300,000 impressions in 90 days
- 1,381 highly targeted new followers
- 51 MQLs
- One week with £300,000+ inbound leads


Client B – Leader in Emerging Tech

Goal: Build authority from scratch, grow an industry audience, and position as a recognised voice.

Result:
- 24,255,000 impressions
- 9,953 engagements on best post
- 3,034 profile views in 90 days
- Grew from 300 connections → 10,000 followers


Client C – CRO at $150M ARR B2B SaaS

Goal: Produce high-quality, technical executive content that drives engagement & industry visibility.

Result:
- 635,363 impressions in first 2 months
- 1.25% engagement rate
- 7,396 reactions, 529 comments, 35 shares
+5,609 profile views


Client D – Co-Founder at £100M Agency, Forbes 30 Under 30

Goal: Create strategic content & outbound to open enterprise doors and generate pipeline.

Result:
- 310,866 content impressions
- 55+ MQLs
- 10+ SQLs in first 2 months (including SVPs at Snap, Paramount, etc)
- Reached senior decision makers across Coca-Cola, Unilever, EA, Ubisoft, etc.
- Attracted organic engagement from execs at Nike, Mars, L’Occitane, Swatch, L'Oréal


Client E – CEO, Energy Tech Platform (1,000+ employee clients)

Goal: Build authority in the energy & climate sector and drive enterprise conversations.

Result:
- 164,676 impressions
- 410 engagements on best post
- 1,411 profile views
- Audience surpassed 16,000+ professionals
- Booked meetings with leaders at Walgreens, Starbucks, GSK, Mars


Client F – Harvard Professor & Author

Goal: Expand thought leadership reach, attract senior decision-makers, and strengthen global influence.

Result:
- 5M+ impressions in 90 days
- 40,000 engagements
- 3,000,000+ impressions on best post
- Earned LinkedIn Top Voice
- Invited to LinkedIn’s exclusive Creator Programme
- 34% of his 78,000 followers are senior decision-makers at 10k+ employee companies

This is what happens when you combine premium positioning, high-quality thought leadership, and human-led outbound into one system designed to earn attention from the people who actually want to reach. 

If you want to build the same level of authority and demand in 2026, send me a message!

If you’re struggling to post consistent, high-quality content, you don’t have a system in place. 

Yesterday we spent 1-hour with a CEO client in the energy space, who with our support is signing enterprise deals through his LinkedIn. 

We ran one of our Strategic Ideation Sessions (think podcast-styled-conversation) where we got 10 posts from 1 hour together. 

They share their incredible ideas, insights & stories. 

We layer in our LinkedIn expertise. 
We run the whole system. 
We do all the research.
We ideate, write, schedule, assets, report. 

This is the power of having a repeatable content engine.
This is how you stay consistent without burning out.
This is how you show up as a category leader every week.

Here’s the posts we ideated: 

1. Tapping into the macro narrative their ICP cares about. 

2. Riding the AI + energy discourse dominating LinkedIn. 

3. Speaking the same language as his prospects. 

4. Reframing risk to shift how his audience thinks. 

5. Building credibility through relatable leadership storytelling. 

6. Reinforcing their biggest commercial differentiator. 

7. Using story + analogy to create memorable insight. 

8. Speaking to enterprise frustration to drive demand. 

9. Delivering a simple “aha” insight for his ICP. 

10. Injecting personality and humour to increase relatability. 


All strategically building the right blend of touch-points to drive 127,221 impressions, 35 MQLs, 5 booked calls with VP's at enterprise companies - in the last 30 days. 

Building his influence - but also generating commercial value.

A Fortune 500 CMO called me last week: "Matt, we're posting 3x a week and getting nowhere. What are we missing?"

I pulled up their content. 

No imagination.
No strategy.
No system.
Not audience-first.
Not LinkedIn-first.
Just… posts.

That's when I showed them the framework we use at Triangle – the same one that's generated 1,500,000 impressions for our clients in the last 30 days.

Every piece of content we create passes through 4 critical filters:

1) The Content Test: Would you stop scrolling for this? We obsess over hooks, clear angles, and making sure there's one unmistakable takeaway your audience will remember. 

2) The Data Layer: Your best-performing post from 6 months ago? Run it again with a fresh hook. That viral TikTok format? Test it on LinkedIn. We track everything – which hooks work, which stories resonate, which formats your ICP actually engages with.

3) The Strategy Check: Every post needs a job. Drive traffic? Build authority? Generate leads? We time posts with industry moments, tag the right people, and always include a clear next step. 

4) The Soul Filter: This is where most content dies. If it doesn't move you, it won't move them. We ask: Could the client have written this themselves? Will anyone care about this next week? Does this actually add value or just add noise?

Posting is not enough. 

You need strategy, results, outcomes with quality & authentic content that genuinely grows your audience and builds authority & trust.

--
We've been working hard on our content formula the last couple months - the image shows screenshots of some of our client results.

While everyone talks about being consistent, it is the No.1 proof point of success. 

The truth is: everything meaningful in business compounds. Authority compounds as you show up with perspective. Trust compounds as people see you week after week. Distribution compounds when your name becomes familiar. But none of these effects reveal themselves quickly. You have to be in the game long enough for the multiplication to begin — and almost nobody is.

This means you need to build a systemised Content Engine for: 

1. Volume/reps over a long time period. 
2. Quality, authentic, original, value-adding content. 

I’ve seen it with clients, we start working together and build momentum, with more touchpoints, more qualified leads, more premium positioning. Then they leave and stop posting. Within weeks, everything slows down. The awareness. The authority. The inbound demand. The shorter sales cycles. All the benefits evaporate as quickly as they appeared. Not because the strategy stopped working — but because the consistency did.

It feels like trite advice, and to be honest, it is. But I believe it is the No.1 factor determining success.

Excited to be sharing our playbook with the Apollo community next week — breaking down the exact system we use to book calls with senior decision makers at companies like Nvidia, Sony Ericsson, Virgin, Starbucks, Walgreens, GSK and more. 

Through a blend of authority-building content, expert positioning, signals and high-intent human-led outbound.

Excited for this one!

Having spent 3 years building leading personal brands, generating over 100 million impressions and now running an agency turning CEO's & Execs into Thought Leaders on LinkedIn, I've always felt that: 

A founder’s voice is the most valuable marketing asset a company has.

We all know, people buy from people. 

And now, the latest data from LinkedIn backs this up. 

– Startups whose founders post at least ten times a year on LinkedIn generate 33% more leads than those who remain silent.

– Deals close 22% faster when buyers feel they know the founder. Sendoso reported an 11% higher win rate and 120% higher deal sizes when prospects followed their executives.

– Hootsuite, CEO Irina Novoselsky traced 37% of monthly leads and £12 million in influenced pipeline directly to her presence on LinkedIn.

This is the commercial ROI of visibility on LinkedIn through Execs.  

The founder’s perspective builds trust long before a sales conversation begins. It strengthens pricing power, accelerates recruitment, and shortens deal cycles.

Momentum also grows quickly once consistency sets in. Founders who post regularly achieve three times more engagement and four times more followers than those who post occasionally. You create organic, value-adding, authority & trust-building touch-points with your network at scale. 

At Triangle, we've seen this first-hand. And have so many case studies showcasing the impact of this in action. 

If you're not activating your CEO & Execs on LinkedIn with authentic content – you're missing out.

How to get 100k+ impressions and booked conversations with enterprise companies through LinkedIn (a case study):

A CEO came to us frustrated that LinkedIn wasn’t driving the growth, visibility, or conversations they expected.

We took over the content (fully DFY) and built an Outbound motion through the CEO’s profile.

Taking him from no traction, no booked conversations, no growth on LinkedIn. 

To these results:  

– 170,000+ impressions
– 1,450 profile views 
– 111 MQLs
- 5% monthly follower growth
– 23 booked calls with VPs at Starbucks, Mars, Lidl, and more. 

Here’s what made the difference:

(1) Content that focused on the buyer – their world, their problems – building trust and content specifically designed to reach audiences beyond their existing network.

(2) A DM approach designed to engage senior decision-makers at 1,000+ companies – targeted, human, conversational, and relationship-based, using our proven data points and message frameworks.

(3) A streamlined, systemised setup so the CEO only needed to dedicate 2 hours a month – we handled the heavy lifting to keep everything consistent (because consistency is what compounds).

Proof that when you combine the right content with targeted outreach – LinkedIn becomes a growth engine.

Want to do the same? Happy to share our learnings over a Strategy call.

taplio

The Battle

Adam Judelson

Matt Swain

Followers

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Performance ScoreAdam Judelson's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreMatt Swain's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

taplio

The Battle

Adam Judelson

Matt Swain

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Adam Judelson's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreMatt Swain's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreAdam Judelson's LinkedIn Performance