Steve Wallace

They call resonance the whole game, not a nice-to-have.

• Wallace teaches messaging through a live rewrite: review what you’re currently saying, rewrite it together, and leave with a script and a reusable framework for any offer on any channel.
• The 90-minute session costs $500.

One post quotes an outreach email Wallace received, with lines like “Mapping independent research firms,” “secondary and social listening,” and “pull early signal before a study is scoped.”

• After more than 15 years selling B2B, they still couldn’t tell what the sender wanted and replied, “No idea what you're talking about.”
• Wallace credits rewritten messaging with getting a small, unknown company in the door with Goodyear, landing a financial advisor a $100K-per-year client, and creating a $50k deal for a five-person startup after a call to the CEO of a $30M company.

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They describe most referral advice as a wish with an implied maybe, distinguishing earning referrals from engineering them. Wallace adds that referral partners should eventually keep each other out of the networking rooms where they met.

Wallace says a referral system built correctly produces more predictable pipeline than most cold outbound campaigns they have run, and offers more than 200,000 cold calls as their basis for comparison.

• Wallace tells owners that a year in a networking group without conversion is a signal to graduate to referral-based client acquisition rather than quit.
• The posts state the position and promise the mechanism — “DM me if you want to see what the system looks like” — without laying out the steps publicly.

The argument recurs across posts without gaining published detail: the framing sharpens from “referrals are scalable” to “hope is not a system, predictability is a system,” but the process itself is only offered on request.

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Charging more, taking on more clients, and working more are the same move — trading time for money — and that move has a limit. They rebuilt their own model to reward good work over the long term, allowing months to pass without taking new clients.

Wallace frames the test this way: if five new clients make you say, “ok, I'm good until these contracts end,” it’s time to examine your model.

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Visible wins keep them going more than new logos, and a portfolio of those wins makes acquisition less difficult. They treat careful follow-through and record-keeping as part of the same value: knowing a client's history is service, while automation is plumbing, not magic.

In a post about their director of sales operations, Wallace says her client-note system worked like a doctor's chart, recalling her asking, “So how's that pain in your left shoulder been since we last met?”

• They credit her with doubling their insurance business, doing digital prospecting for their 2022 consulting launch, and replacing her massage income in eight months after 20 years as a licensed massage therapist and owning a spa that closed during covid.
• A separate post shows an AI meeting notetaker automatically sending labeled call notes to Wallace's CRM; they joke that setup “only took about 283 hours.”

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They’re openly critical of their own channel, calling themself an outbound bro while ranking cold calling against ten unpleasant tasks. The same account carries a personal community appeal, a different register from the sales posts, and Wallace treats live events as part of how they work.

One post lists things Wallace would rather do than cold call, from drinking a pina colada on a beach to being transferred and put on hold again, with cold calling between two of them.

• Another asks Wallace's network to help a laid-off family friend find work, listing her healthcare billing, medical terminology and HIPAA, executive assistant, caregiving, and customer service background, and offering Wallace's email for her resume.
• Wallace also describes attending the Badass Business Summit five years running, calling it the best conference in the micro-to-small-business space and speaking there on using strategic partnerships and referrals to avoid burnout.

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Wallace quotes an outreach email they received, with lines like "Mapping independent research firms" and "secondary and social listening," and says that after more than 15 years selling B2B, they still couldn’t tell what the sender wanted.

• They replied, "No idea what you're talking about," then argue that the rep will blame the channel, CRM or script, when the real failure is that the message doesn’t make sense to the person reading it.
• The post diagnoses unclear messaging through a real example rather than laying out a framework.

For brands planning a campaign

Use as the opening exercise in a messaging workshop: have participants read jargon-heavy outreach aloud, then rewrite it in plain language before discussing channels or tooling.

Wallace separates hoping, waiting and randomly asking for referrals from manufacturing and engineering them.

• They say a built referral system produces more predictable pipeline than most cold outbound they’ve run, and cite more than 200,000 cold calls so the argument doesn’t read as inexperience with outbound.
• The post states the position strongly but doesn’t lay out the system’s steps.

For brands planning a campaign

Frame a workshop module around the distinction between referral luck and referral engineering, and ask Wallace to supply the step-by-step process the post only promises.

Wallace argues that client acquisition is a hamster wheel and that the compensation model underneath determines whether new revenue actually changes anything.

• They describe rebuilding the model for their own business so months can pass without taking on clients, in contrast to repeatedly trading more time for more money.
• The post is about the economics of running a consultancy, not closing tactics.

For brands planning a campaign

Broaden a messaging workshop into a model check: have participants map how new clients affect their time and cash flow before adding more outreach.

Wallace lists common referral advice — do good work and referrals will come; ask at the end of every project — and says each contains an implied maybe.

• They contrast earning referrals with engineering them, and call manufacturing a repeatable process that creates warm introductions without relying on luck.
• The post ends by offering to show the system rather than explaining it.

For brands planning a campaign

Use it to set expectations for a workshop: the session needs to replace hope with named steps, because the post itself only names the problem.

Wallace tells the story of a longtime massage therapist who became their director of sales operations.

• They describe her client-note system as a kind of CRM, her ownership of a spa before COVID, and how she helped double their insurance business and replaced her massage income in eight months.
• The post is personal and humorous, treating care, follow-through and operational discipline as sales assets.

For brands planning a campaign

A candidate case study for a workshop on referral and relationship follow-through: the story shows the habits Wallace values in a pipeline role.

Wallace says cold calling sucks, admits they’re an outbound bro, then ranks cold calling against ten unpleasant tasks in a comedic list. The post doesn’t teach a method; it establishes their tone and willingness to criticize their own channel.

For brands planning a campaign

Could open a session on why outbound alone is not enough, but pair it with a method post, such as the referral-engineering argument, so the session doesn’t stop at attitude.

In one post, they quote a sales rep’s message — phrases like "mapping independent research firms," "secondary and social listening," and "pull early signal before a study is scoped" — and say that after more than 15 years selling B2B, they still couldn’t tell what the sender wanted.

• They predict the rep will cycle through networking, ads, a new CRM, and a new script before questioning the message itself.
• Elsewhere, they list results attributed to rewritten messaging: an email that got a small, unknown company in the door with Goodyear; rewritten outreach that landed a $100K-per-year client for a financial advisor; and a call to the CEO of a $30M company that created a $50k deal for a five-person startup.

A 90-minute session: review what the client is currently saying, rewrite it together live, and leave with a script and a repeatable framework. Wallace says they taught the frameworks at Guardian, MaverickApp, and B2B Rev Co.

For brands planning a campaign

For a messaging workshop, the sellable core is diagnosing and rewriting the client’s own live language: take an actual email or call script and show why it fails to start conversations. Use the jargon example as the teaching device and the case list to frame the outcomes.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2 · Source 3

They say a properly built referral system produces more predictable pipeline than most cold outbound campaigns they’ve run, citing more than 200,000 cold calls as their basis for comparison.

• In a separate post, they call most referral strategies wishes rather than strategies — "hope is not a system; predictability is a system" — and distinguish earning referrals from engineering them.
• A third post tells business owners that once referral partners are in place, the partners’ job is to keep each other out of networking rooms.
• A year in a networking group without conversion, they say, is a signal to graduate to referral-based client acquisition rather than quit.

A step-by-step, repeatable process for creating warm introductions. Wallace offers to show the system by direct message; ask for a preview of the process before booking.

One post in this theme is a conference testimonial, not a how-to: Wallace says they return to the Badass Business Summit each year and speak there about using strategic partnerships and referrals to avoid burnout.

For brands planning a campaign

This is the clearest workshop hook for a campaign aimed at marketers seeking a step-by-step, repeatable process for producing warm introductions without relying on luck or timing. Brands can assess whether Wallace delivers system design or motivation; they explicitly position the difference.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2 · Source 3 · Source 4

They locate the cause below close rate and pricing, in the compensation model.

• Charging more, taking on more clients, and working more are all the same move — trading time for money — and that move has a limit.
• They say they rebuilt their own model to reward good work over the long term, allowing months to pass without taking new clients.

For brands planning a campaign

For consultancies advising owner-operators, this is a workshop segment on retainer and compensation structures that decouple revenue from new-client volume. Brands can assess whether Wallace can move the conversation from tactics to the underlying business model, differentiating the session from pure outbound training.

Examples: Source 1

They also note that a portfolio of such wins makes client acquisition easier.

• A separate post profiles Jenn, a licensed massage therapist of 20 years who kept her own client-notes system so she could speak to each client as a doctor would, referencing the last check-in.
• She built and ran a large spa before covid, then helped Wallace’s insurance business double, did digital prospecting for their consulting business in 2022, and now runs sales operations with a path to chief operating officer.

For brands planning a campaign

Useful for brands selling customer-success or sales-ops tooling: this is a human, care-based story about retention and follow-through, not just acquisition. In a messaging-and-referral workshop, it supports the case that follow-through and depth in existing relationships are part of the pipeline.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

In the Jenn post, they describe her manual client-notes system as the level of care a massage practice achieved.

• In another post, they describe an AI meeting notetaker that automatically sends call notes to their CRM — prelabeled, addressed to the right contact, organized, and automated — and joke that it "only took about 283 hours" to set up.
• The tone is practical rather than evangelistic: automation as plumbing, not magic.

Automation appears in two of twelve posts; in one, the tool is mentioned mainly for comedic effect.

For brands planning a campaign

For CRM, sales-ops, or AI-notetaker brands, the fit is a workflow walkthrough or demo-style co-marketing, not a hype post. Expect a plain demonstration of what the tool does and how long it took to set up, not an abstract productivity pitch.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

One lists things Wallace would rather do than cold calling, in descending order of preference, slotting cold calling between two of them; another calls the AI-notetaker setup a 283-hour win.

• They use direct calls to action — "DM me if you want to see what the system looks like" — and point to a paid-booking link in the comments.
• Concrete numbers — Goodyear’s $18.3 billion, a $100K-per-year client, a $50k deal — do the persuading rather than adjectives.
• One post shifts register entirely: a community appeal asking their network to help a laid-off family friend find work.
• It lists her healthcare-billing, medical-terminology, executive-assistant, caregiving, and customer-service background and offers to forward her resume.

The job-search post shows Wallace using their reach for a personal, non-commercial ask, a distinct use of the channel and a different tone from their sales posts.

For brands planning a campaign

Expect a plain, contrarian, example-heavy voice with humor and occasional "outbound bro" framing, plus a record of live speaking and priced sessions.

• The register isn’t corporate-polished.
• For a live, interactive workshop for marketers, this voice suits the format better than a keynote monologue.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2 · Source 3 · Source 4 · Source 5 · Source 6

It includes a review of the client's current language, a live rewrite, and a take-away script plus a repeatable framework for any offer on any channel.

• They pitch it to people who "lose people in the first 30 seconds" on the phone, in a room, or in an inbox.
• Ask for details of the referral system, which they show on request.

Live rewrite plus a reusable framework; small, time-boxed, and priced per session.

For brands planning a campaign

The consultancy needs a messaging-and-referral workshop for its clients; Wallace already sells a smaller version of the messaging half at a known price and in a defined format.

• Brands can build on that tested format and add the referral-system half.
• Ask for details on that less-documented portion.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

Ask for details of their formal relationship with the business.

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Ask for details of their role and any commercial arrangement.

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Ask for details of their role and any commercial arrangement.

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Ask whether the appearance was sponsored.

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Wallace shows a jargon-filled email they couldn't decode and argues the channel was never the problem; this podcast describes consultants who paid for a year of LinkedIn outbound, got sixty meetings, and heard "who are you and how did this get on my calendar?" Both treat volume sending as a cost rather than a tactic, and position messaging as the key to making outreach work.

Wallace argues in short posts and sells a live 90-minute rewrite of a client's own language. This material consists of long-form podcast episodes about consulting positioning, with the efficiency argument framed as reaching 40 to 50 highly targeted prospects instead of 1,000.

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Wallace warns that a rep will cycle through networking, ads, a new CRM, and a new script before questioning the message; this material makes the same argument from the buyer's side: a big list and a generic pitch burn a name with the buyers an owner wants, while three good matches beat three hundred loose ones. Both treat referral-led growth as a pattern to understand rather than dismiss.

The recent posts focus on outbound infrastructure and AI as a control layer, and the offer is a free prospect-research exercise around a firm's best client. Wallace focuses on message resonance and engineering referral introductions as a system, with a paid messaging session rather than prospect research.

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Wallace tells owners that a year in a networking group without conversion is a signal to graduate to referral-based acquisition; this material frames the same shift as pull instead of hunt, with prospects arriving already trusting you. Both treat referrals as a relationship question rather than a matter of luck.

This material locates the answer in positioning and visibility — who already runs into the problem you solve — and asks the audience to answer questions rather than promising a system. Wallace locates the answer in a step-by-step referral process, offers to show it by message, and gives a clear price for the messaging half.

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In the reviewed episodes, a managing partner pays a premium agency for a year of LinkedIn outbound, gets 60 booked meetings and closes nothing because prospects had no idea why they were on the call.

• The argument that follows: volume outreach fails consultants because most recipients have not even started thinking about the problem being sold.
• The suggested fix is positioning, not more sending: decide who you serve, what problem you solve and how you are different, then reach 40 targeted prospects instead of 1,000.
• Choose Ahmad when the workshop's job is to make clients narrow their market and stop buying channels, and when a questioning, diagnostic style suits the room better than a live script rewrite.

Podcast discussions focus on a consultant's own positioning, not a taught, time-boxed session a consultancy can resell.

• The episodes show the diagnosis and principles, but not a live rewrite, take-away script or repeatable framework participants can keep.
• The argument stops at getting the positioning right, rather than giving each participant new words to use this week.
• Wallace is the safer buy when the goal is for every attendee to leave with rewritten outreach and a framework they can reuse across offers and channels.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

In the posts, ask an agency owner who their best client is and they answer in seconds; ask for ten more like that one and you get silence.

• Tom B.'s proposed fix is to write down why the best client bought — the trigger that made them look, the title of the person who signed, the problem they could not solve alone — then find companies with the same shape.
• The argument: three good matches beat three hundred loose ones.
• Pick Tom B. when the workshop's outcome is a small, high-quality target list each owner can use to write a personal message, and when the audience wants to hear where AI tooling is taking outbound, a thread they develop in a separate post about connecting outbound infrastructure to AI assistants.

The posts address the outbound side of the same problem Wallace frames as referrals.

• Tom B. treats outbound as worth doing well; Wallace argues that a built referral system produces a more predictable pipeline than most cold outbound they have run.
• They recommend opposite first moves, so the consultancy must choose which philosophy it wants its clients taught.
• The posts show no priced or time-boxed session, and the AI-infrastructure piece describes a development Tom B. expects, not a method they have already taught.
• A buyer who needs a documented referral process or a proven workshop format should start with Wallace.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

The posts contrast hunting — waking up, targeting prospects, moving in for the close — with creating pull, so that by the time a conversation happens, the prospect already trusts the person and sees working with them as the obvious choice.

• The referral angle is narrower and more diagnostic than Wallace's.
• Rather than offer a system, Ed asks who is actually positioned to refer you, noting that knowing 500 people matters little if few of them regularly encounter the problem you solve.
• They prompt each reader to name the profession of the person who sent their last good referral.
• Choose Ed when the workshop's value is a positioning and network audit: which relationships are worth building, and what each client should do to attract rather than chase.

The posts focus on attraction and framing, using heavily formatted posts rather than a step-by-step process.

• The referral piece ends with a research question to readers rather than a repeatable method.
• There is no published workshop shape or priced session to build a group format around.
• A buyer who needs every participant to leave with a rewritten script and documented referral process gets more from Wallace; Ed is the better complement when the room's real problem is positioning and choosing which relationships to invest in, not language and systems.

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