Season 2 is here—and we're kicking it off with the conversation every marketer loves: asking for budget.Jess has big goals, a solid strategy, and one tiny problem: she needs money. Real money. Not the "ask permission for every shiny sponsorship" kind—an actual, formal quarterly budget.So, she builds her first-ever marketing budget, wraps it in a killer deck, and presents it to Josh and Nick. The number's big. Really big. But then something happens—they get excited.Hear how Jess convinced two founders to hand over hundreds of thousands of dollars, why the story matters way more than the spreadsheet, and what happens when your CEO gets so nervous he starts sounding like Goofy.Get to the good stuff:[00:00] Season 2 kicks off! Jess needs a budget. Josh braces for impact.[02:46] Jess had only ever built content budgets before. It’s a fraction of the plan, but it’s where you start—if you don't have anything to talk about, there's nothing to amplify.[04:40] Josh approaches Jess about building a budget before she has to beg for one. Makes the whole "money, please" conversation way easier.[06:24] The reverse prenup: why having a formal budget gives marketers power to make decisions without having to justify every dollar.[09:07] Jess is low-key panicking. First time building a budget. Zero historical data. No "what worked last quarter" safety net. Just ambition, strategy, and a spreadsheet.[11:45] Jess's presentation strategy. The balance of making Josh and Nick feel excited and just a little nervous. That's how you know you're asking for what you actually need.[15:10] Jess comes armed with receipts from industry friends. She's done her homework. Obviously.[16:49] The big reveal. The big number. Josh falls out of his seat. Nick couldn’t Venmo it. Cue minor CEO heart attack.[21:45] Jess's advisor moment. He tells her to forget the pretty spreadsheet, the secret weapon is the story. A budget pitch is no different to any other pitch.[22:30] The Nick test will be hard to pass. Jess presents to Josh first to get his buy-in, trust, and a little feedback first.[26:24] Jess get her allotted soppy praise moment from Josh, but it’s well deserved. She executed and built trust.[29:32] Josh takes the budget to their board and advisors. Because even CEOs need backup. [32:42] Jess’ budget gets cut. But wait, she’s actually grateful? [35:03] Positive affirmations break. You're a marketing wizard.[36:24] Jess's key budget-building takeaways: let strategy guide your budget, sell the story, acknowledge other budget pressures and shoot for the moon.[37:37] Jess's life goal: someday ask for more money than the AWS bill. She’s dreaming big people.[39:00] The one thing Jess forgot: travel. Don't worry—Josh and Nick are just docking it from her paycheck. Motel 6, here she comes.This Meeting Could’ve Been a Podcast is a Vector production.Filmed and produced by Sweet Fish.Editing by Handy Man Edit.Music by Peter McIsaac Music.

Season 2 of This Meeting Could've Been a Podcast drops November 5th.8 new episodes.Same great taste.Peep the trailer to get a sneak peek of what's on Jess and Josh's agenda this time around.

Josh happily announces he’s redesigning the website. Jess smiles and nods while she internally screams in marketer.But Jess spots an opportunity. Maybe we don’t need a whole new website. But the messaging and a few key visuals? They might just need a little work. Hear how Jess steered Josh away from climbing a mountain of redesign and dev work and toward small messaging and visual tweaks that do a whole lot of heavy lifting.  Get to the good stuff:[00:00] Josh shows off a brand new website design just before a new product launch – surprise, Jess![01:07] Vector’s website origin story (before the ghosts took over)[06:02] Jess compliments Josh’s original messaging. Then shares why she changed it.[07:51] Sit back marketers, and let us say nice things about you.[8:27] Shameless plug: The product launch that kicked off Josh’s idea to revamp the website.[10:58] Jess explains why she changed the headline from “grow your MQLs” to “turn intent into pipeline.”[14:08] Why we used graphics to show off the product (and the ghost mascot, of course).[16:53] Josh explains the reasoning behind his urge to redesign the website, and how the team hit a healthy middle ground.This Meeting Could’ve Been a Podcast is a Vector production.Filmed at the Sweet Fish Creator House in Orlando, FL.Editing by Handy Man Edit.Music by Peter McIsaac Music.

Jess didn’t tiptoe into her new role—she marched in, spotted the gaps, and asked for headcount by day 2. Josh? Still processing.In this episode, Jess and Josh unpack the thinking behind their first big hire at Vector, why product marketing came before growth, what made one candidate rise above 65 others, and how building the right team early on turned heads across the industry. TL;DR: If you’ve ever had to scale fast—or want to know how Vector assembled the B2B marketing Avengers—this one’s for you.Get to the good stuff:[00:00] Jess reminds Josh that she asked to make her first hire… 48 hours in. Josh has not recovered.[01:08] How Vector’s ideal customer shaped Jess’s hiring criteria: credibility, practitioner experience, and a dash of envy.[03:22] “Are you building the Avengers?” Josh reveals the industry buzz about Vector’s marketing team.[05:19] Jess shares why she prioritized senior, practitioner-led hires over junior generalists—especially in a startup environment.[06:40] Content + PMM = rocket fuel – why demand gen had to wait [08:18] Affirmation time, baby[10:18] The 1+1=3 moment: Jess makes her case (live, in person) for building out the team.[13:50] The "I'm hiring" LinkedIn post? 55K views, 53 reposts, 65+ applications—and how Jess filtered the noise to find standout talent.[17:10] The winning combo that makes marketers stand out: peer recommendations, great writing, clear thinking, and... following directions.[21:04] Top 1% hiring mentality: why the best people say no to comfort and yes to building.[23:18] Enter: Alex. Why her experience at Metadata, founder-ready mindset, and “recipe-like” walkthroughs sealed the deal.[27:00] Sales enablement, product launches, content libraries, positioning tweaks—Alex is already doing all the things.[28:52] What’s next? Jess reveals her plans for staying lean—and what role she’ll hire for next (but not yet, don’t DM her).This Meeting Could’ve Been a Podcast is a Vector production.Filmed at the Sweet Fish Creator House in Orlando, FL.Editing by Handy Man Edit.Music by Peter McIsaac Music.

Josh wants stardom. Jess wants structure. Co-founder Nick mostly wants to avoid another content calendar.When Jess joined Vector, she quickly sniffed out a classic case of wasted brilliance: the founders had great takes—they just weren’t sharing them consistently. Vector’s LinkedIn presence was ghosting its own potential… until Jess built a system that turned sporadic founder inspiration into a pipeline-generating content machine.Hear how Jess transformed Josh and Nick’s raw thoughts into LinkedIn gold. And used AI to multiply their genius without losing their unique voices to bot-speak.Spoiler: Josh might be an influencer now. Sort of.Get to the good stuff:[00:00] Jess gently suggests more LinkedIn posting. Josh’s response? “Ain’t nobody got time for that.” [00:20] Josh admits that Jess pushed founder content from day one—and it’s now one of Vector’s biggest pipeline drivers.[00:45] Jess explains why founder POV matters. It builds trust, credibility, and actual conversions.[01:30] The old way? A one-way ticket to Ghost Town. The new way? A repeatable, scalable system that’s genuine and authentic.[03:15] Jess reveals step one in her chaos-to-content playbook: using AI (Claude) to extract the gold from Josh and Nick’s brain dumps.[04:00] Step two? Feed that raw brilliance into Claude to shape the structure and tone-of-voice.[06:10] Next comes the weekly content-mining ritual: 30 minutes of unscripted rambling that turns out to be a goldmine of high-performing content.[08:22] Ditch Zoom, move to StreamYard or Riverside (or similar!) Jess and Josh consider why video quality matters more than you think.[09:19] Claude plays content editor (with a little help from Descript), restructuring messy thoughts into tight, engaging stories. [12:39] “Wait… did I write this?” When AI-generated posts sound exactly like you, it’s weird but also kinda magical.[13:30] Turns out it only takes 4 hours a week to create 4–5 solid posts for two founders. No burnout, no excuses.[15:37] Jess cracked the content code: build a voice that sounds human, and humans will actually listen. Josh is into it—and honestly? You will be too.[15:50] Josh reflects on the impact of Vector’s outbreak content—from product demos quadrupling to elevated partnerships where top brands want to be associated with Vector.[17:20] Time for some measurement and optimization. Jess wants to review the top performers, study the hooks, and find the topics that resonate... then make the system work even harder.[19:22] Josh thanks Jess for making him an influencer… kinda.[19:37] Jess and Josh drop some love for marketers who are trying their best, even when they feel invisible. [25:14] Josh shares how he’s learned to ditch performative content, and how audiences can smell fake from a mile away. This Meeting Could’ve Been a Podcast is a Vector production.Filmed at the Sweet Fish Creator House in Orlando, FL.Editing by Handy Man Edit.Music by Peter McIsaac Music.