Tom Hunt

$3.6m ARR. $0 raised. I have no idea what I'm doing.

Jan 2014.I'm walking home from a depressing New Year's trip to Oslo with an ex. girlfriend.It's raining in East London.I made a decision:I would replace my management consulting salary (£42,000) by the end of the year.I had no idea from where, but that was the goal...I just about hit it and left the corporate world.And I haven't been back since.Fast forward a decade and I've:- Tried and failed with 17 businesses- Invested in 11- Learnt a LOTThe one that is finally working is called Fame:- We have a weird culture (in a good way)- We start and grow podcasts for B2B businesses- We are fully remote and have 75 full-time team membersI live for our awesome team at Fame, building businesses and great marketing.And I post about them here 🤗

Founder & CEO

We start and grow the world's most profitable B2B podcasts.

Clients include:

👉 IDEO
👉 Workday
👉 HighRadius
👉 People.ai
👉 Zendesk
👉 Bevy
👉 Circle
👉 Suzy
👉 Mazars
👉 LeanData
👉 CXL
👉 Ramp
👉 Alibaba
👉 Signify
👉 eToro

$4.5m ARR. $0 raised. I have no idea what I’m doing.

“We need to let them go.”

I’m in a 1-1 and a manager thinks someone in their team isn’t performing.

I'm in shock, to me they seemed enthusiastic and a culture fit.


We dug into the details:

- What weren’t they doing?
- Why weren’t they doing it?

The manager thought they either didn't understand or couldn't do the role.

Then I ask:

“How did onboarding go?”

“What do you mean by onboarding?” they reply.


And that's when we found the issue:

We skipped the onboarding process and replaced it with "a couple of calls".


If you’re recruiting right, you owe it to yourself to onboard right.

You can’t expect someone to join and start performing, you need to set them up to succeed.

Onboard right or do it twice.

Agree?

I had a terrible boss.

And I spent more time with them than my partner.
 

They never raised their voice.

They smiled (kind of).

But they also started:

- Passing my ideas off as their own
- Expecting email responses at 10pm
- “Checking in” multiple times per day
 
Again, they weren’t ever aggressive or rude, they just slowly eroded my confidence each day.

I thought this was normal e.g. you get a job, you get a manager like this.
 

And then…

I moved roles and got a new manager, they:

- Stepped in when needed
- Never emailed after hours
- Saved most comms to our weekly 1-1
 

A great manager won’t get you promoted.

They will change the trajectory of your career.

Agree?

My 7 favourite startup lies:


1. We’re scaling
-- No, you still don't know how/if you'll be profitable

2. We’re going viral
-- No, your CEO’s LinkedIn fundraise post got a few more likes than normal

3. TechCrunch picked us up
-- No, your $10k per month PR agency got you featured

4. We’re partnering with Google
-- No, you’re paying Google Cloud for servers

5. The inbound pipeline is strong
-- No, some competitors requested a demo to see what you’re building

6. We have FANG-level talent
-- No, one of your devs interned at Netflix 6 years ago

7. The team are fully incentivised
-- No, they have paper options based on an inflated fundraise


And my absolute favourite:

8. We’re worth $30m
-- No, a hyped up VC gave you this valuation to make themselves look good (so they can raise their next fund)


Thank god we don't have to lie to ourselves.

Here’s to the bootstrappers 🥂

(Exit the hype-train and subscribe to Cash Machines)

I probably shouldn’t share this…

I like to call it the “Pay Rise Formula”.


Most people go about asking for money in the completely wrong way:

1. Pay review arrives
2. “Can I have more money?”

It’s an easy "not yet" from the boss.


But if you follow these three steps, you boost your chances of a pay rise by at least 56%:

(Not a guarantee but it works)

1. 6 months before the pay review ask your boss: “what do I need to be doing in the next 6 months to get a pay-rise?”

2. Write those things down and make a plan to hit them. Work hard.

3. A few weeks before the pay review, show the list (with things ticked off) to your boss in a 1-1 and ask them to confirm if you are actually doing those things


If done right, there is no way a boss can push back on a raise with the "not yet" excuse.

Pro-activity pays.

Agree?

"OK let me get this straight..."

"Because it kind of sounds like you built yourself a job."


It's 11:37pm in 2017 and I'm sat with a good friend enjoying a spicy margarita in a seedy city bar.

He's shouting into my ear because they closed something called a "Series A":

- How their going to change the world
- An upcoming TechCrunch article
- All the people he needs to hire
- Their "enterprise motion"


But something isn't making sense to me:

1. He has to report to the board every month
2. Any cost greater than £25k must have board sign off
3. He can't take cash out whenever he wants
4. Board needs to sign off his salary
4. If he leaves in the next 4 years he only keeps a slice of his own company
5. If they don't sell it for a massive amount he may get nothing
6. To sell it, they need investor sign off


He replies:

"Yeah I see what you're saying, but the reality is the company is now valued at £20m, my stake is £6m, so I'm basically a multi-millionaire"

😳


As you can imagine, it didn't work out well.

Glad I stuck to building Cash Machines.

$4.5 million ARR, 0 raised.

$500 invested.

It’s been a wild ride.


We have built Fame as a service business with mostly intangible assets.

We did it without selling a single piece of equity to venture capital.

But even asset-light businesses get stuck.

You often need to buy speed to hire a star developer, fund a new marketing campaign, or pay a tax bill.

In those moments, I did not want to wait weeks for a bank.

Unless I had another option.

An option like iwoca.


They fund small businesses that move quickly and have already funded 100,000 businesses in the UK. 

They lent £3.3 billion to business owners who need to move fast and build resilience.

You can apply for business finance between £1,000 and £1M in about five minutes.

They typically give you a decision within 24 hours.

Apply here to check your options: https://lnkd.in/euSG4SCm

NOTE - applying does not impact your credit score.

#Ad

Brand partnership • $4.5m ARR. $0 raised. I have no idea what I’m doing.

It felt like the responsible thing to do... 


But then it turned out to be one of the worst business decisions ever.

Depreciating assets hurt the balance sheet, locking up capital that could be used for growth. 

For example... 

We are in a hiring sprint, bringing on 2 - 3 new team members in Feb. 

Old Tom would have dropped thousands upfront for laptops that would be worth significantly less by next year.

That isn’t scaling.

It’s a cash drain.

Instead, we are using Raylo.

It took 60 seconds to set up a subscription for the latest HP laptops, and they arrived the next day.

Here is why I recommend Raylo as an affordable option for small businesses:

- Protect Your Cash: We paid £0 upfront. Every pound saved on hardware goes straight into growth.

- Upgrade Freedom: With the MacBook M5 rumors floating around, I am not worried because we can upgrade the team to the latest models for free with Raylo's monthly rolling option.

- Zero Drama: If something goes wrong with a device during the subscription, Raylo's Lifetime Warranty covers technical faults and they sort it quickly.


Or in other words:

Stop buying "stuff" that rots on your balance sheet. 

Convert your tech to OpEx and keep your capital for growth.

Check out the subscription options for your team here: mdsh.io/raylo-business 

#Ad

Luke Shalom

CEO @ Grow Solo I help the C-suite turn industry expertise into predictable pipeline

There are two ways agency founders try to turn LinkedIn into a reliable source of clients.

One is by guessing. Posting when there is time. Relying on referrals and hoping the next month is a good one.

The other is by building a system that creates steady conversations, even when client work gets busy.

Our clients choose the second.

→ Joya Dass (Founder, Women’s Leadership Lab)

The problem:

- She spent hours in the DMs to book a few calls.
- Content happened on weekends.
- When delivery picked up, sales stopped.

Some months were strong. Others were quiet.

Even in good months, there was stress about where the next client would come from.

What we did:

We built a simple LinkedIn content system she could run in house. No ghostwriter or agency retainer dependency.

We shifted her content from generic how to posts to insight driven thinking.

That changed the conversations. People in her network showed up aligned and ready to buy.

We added a content led outbound system powered by a setter we hited and trained. The system kept working while she focused on delivery.

Results:

- Revenue grew from $150k to $300k.
- Sales became predictable.
- The pressure eased.

→ Jonathan Crowder (Founder, Founders Ally)

The problem:

- No time for content.
- Unpredictable sales calls.
- Leads with no budget.
- No sales background. A 10 percent close rate.

What we did:

We removed Jonathan as the bottleneck. 

We built a content system using AI supported by his real thinking. It sounded like him, not software.

Trust was built before the call. Outbound went from 10% to 40% response rates.

We focused prospecting on real buying moments, like recent funding to catch buyers at the right time.

We simplified his sales process. Clear outcomes. Clear cost of inaction was communicated to his buyers.

Results:

- Meetings went from 3-5 a month to 10-15 sales qualifed leads a month.
- A visible pipeline. Increase to a 25 percent close rate.
- $300k in pipeline in 60 days.
- $30k in new revenue closed.

→ Brian Dukes (COO, Exit Wise)

The problem

- Ovelry dependent on referrals.
- No LinkedIn playbook.
- No time to write.

What we did

- We clarified positioning.
- Simplified the offer.
- Built a content engine.

Then we added outbound from the founder profile.

Everything was owned and run internally.

Results:

- Consistent posting machine.
- 500 to 6500 ICP followers.
- $740,000 in LinkedIn-driven revenue over two years.

We have helped 100+ founder led agencies replace unpredictable growth with systems they understand and control.

If this feels familiar, we should talk.

Founder

We help executives to build and monetize their brand on linkedin by scaling your content and turning it into leads, authority and thought leadership.

How?

Engagement + DM flows = Qualified meetings. 

Done with you. Done for you.

Everyone is losing their minds over the new LinkedIn algorithm. 

But I’ll break down every change I’ve seen in 2026, 2 mins so you can gain an fair advantage:

1) Your profile, content and offer have to be aligned to drive reach
 
You used to be able to post about anything and get substantial reach. Now LinkedIn is looking to showcase authorities in specific niches. 

If your content doesn’t match the positioning on your profile, LinkedIn is more likely to label your content as “this person doesn’t usually talk about this so they can’t be an expert” and show less of it. 

How to fix this? 

Keeping everything aligned helps ensure your posts have the best possible chance of staying in the feed (cited from a Jodie Cook Forbes article and bolstered by Chris Donnelly).

2) Random pictures < relevant media
 
No longer can you post a random selfie to “boost reach”. It literally makes zero difference now. 

The real change? LinkedIn is now prioritising content with “relevant media”. This is essentially anything that aids the understanding of the post itself.
 
The litmus test here is simple. If your picture isn’t relevant to the post, it doesn’t need one.
 
3) Posts last 48 hours < posts last weeks in the feed
 
2024/25 saw posts hit peak velocity in 24–48 hours and then slowly decline. Now the algorithm has moved towards prioritising evergreen content. 

How do you adapt? 

Reduce your “recent news” content around events and increase your production of content that provides evergreen insight.

Get this right and you only need a few bangers to drive pipeline for the year. 

5 of my founder teardown posts made up about 20% of my monthly reach despite being posts from 6 months ago.
 
4) If AI can write it, it’s not good enough
 
Everyone is using Chat. And now everyone’s a writer. The problem is AI will always deviate towards the median of what it thinks “good content” should look like. 

That’s leading to a feed clogged with mediocre content. First rule, if AI can write your idea, it’s not good enough. 

The easiest shift is to stop generic how-to content and reframe everything through the lens of “How I do this”.
 
5) Prioritising the wrong CTAs for growth
 
It used to be follows and reshares that drove reach. Now it’s all about SAVES.

 How many people enjoyed your content enough to want to come back to it later. This signals higher dwell time too.  

This isn’t just about asking for saves though. It’s about how well your hook communicates the message of the post and how evergreen the structure is so people can actually use it later. 

But if you want a short-term plaster, simply asking for a save will still move the needle even if you don’t fix the content upstream.
 
-

If you enjoyed this post, make sure to hit “save” so you can come back to this laster”

Founder at Atticus | Predictable LinkedIn pipeline using a founder-led sales system I 100+ clients scaled | Be the next 👉 atticusagency.com

Stop sending DMs that get ignored. I booked 1,000+ sales calls from LinkedIn and made $1.3M doing. Steal the exact script ↓

Comment and I'll send it to you.

I used to spend hours crafting the "perfect" DM. Tweaking. Rewriting. Getting ghosted anyway and following up like a desperate ex.

Now I use a 5-message sequence I've tested for 3 years straight. Instead of 18 rejections out of 20, we are booking 20-40 calls a month.

Every conversation feels like it came from them.

Here's what's inside:

- DM 1: Open with context, not a pitch
- DM 2: Follow up without sounding desperate
- DM 3: Uncover their pain in natural conversation
- DM 4: Transition to a call without it feeling forced
- DM 5: Make it stupid easy to book the meeting
- The complete walkthrough...  all 5 messages in action
- 5 mistakes that kill your DM conversion rate
- How to customise the script for your ICP

BONUS: DM Personalisation Framework that gets 80% response rates.
It took me 2 years and 1,000+ DMs to build. Takes you 60 seconds to steal.

Stop using LinkedIn DMs like a cold email channel. 

Start using them like a trust-building machine.

How to get it: 

1/ Connect with me 2/ Comment below and I'll DM you everything

♻️ Repost to skip the queue. 

P.S. We must be connected... otherwise LinkedIn blocks the message.

P.SS The perplexity lead magnet will be coming over today/ tomorrow... keep those eyes peeled!

taplio

The Battle

Tom Hunt

Luke Shalom

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance ScoreTom Hunt's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreLuke Shalom's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

taplio

The Battle

Tom Hunt

Luke Shalom

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);}Tom Hunt's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreLuke Shalom's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreTom Hunt's LinkedIn Performance