Hey everyone, we're changing things up a bit this week. Shorter reads and more of the details that matter when running a business. The goal is to make this newsletter more useful without taking up more time.
Let me know what you think.
– Jon
ENTREPRENEURSHIP
1. More than a following
In a LinkedIn post that went live in October, entrepreneur Adam Robinson wrote that his company RB2B had reached $10 million in annual recurring revenue. Less than a month later, a Learjet carrying Robinson, his wife Helen Sharp, their two young children, and five others crashed in Palm Beach County, Florida. All souls on board unfortunately passed away.
It's a tragic loss for the families involved and the entrepreneurial community Robinson had become such a prominent part of.
He was 45 and spent much of his career building software companies while sharing his experiences publicly. His successes attracted plenty of attention, but so did his radical candor when it came to difficult parts of running a business.
A little background: Robinson started his career on Wall Street at Lehman Brothers, before moving into software and co-founding the email marketing platform Robly.
That business eventually led to Retention.com, which helped online retailers identify anonymous website visitors and recover lost sales. Robinson said he grew it to $22 million ARR in four years without raising venture capital.
His latest company, RB2B, helps businesses identify potential customers visiting their websites, even when those visitors don't fill out a contact form. It sends their LinkedIn profiles to sales teams through Slack so they can follow up.
But Robinson's own strategy for attracting customers was more interesting.
The LinkedIn playbook: In a March essay, Robinson explained how he built an audience of 150,000 followers through more than 700 posts and 55 million impressions over three years.
He started by studying successful creators like marketer Chris Walker, then started sharing revenue figures, discussing business struggles, and telling stories about his experience. The response to his posts about B2B sales was so strong that Robinson said it inspired him to launch RB2B in the first place.
My take: Robinson understood that building an audience could serve a bigger purpose than generating leads. His content helped him figure out what customers wanted, and he turned that insight into a $10 million-a-year business.
He was super open about how he did it, too. His nine lessons from three years on LinkedIn are worth reading.
CREATOR SPOTLIGHT
2. Double take
Cadillac salesperson Andrea Anderson doubled her Instagram following from 200,000 to more than 400,000 in a single month. Known online as Andrea Sells Cadillac, she now has a combined following of more than 610,000 across her major social platforms, according to figures shared with our team.
And those followers are buying cars.
Anderson works at Andrews Cadillac in Brentwood, Tennessee, where she was already selling more than 20 vehicles a month before becoming a content creator.
"I was good at my job, but needed more people to know about it," she told our team.
How it started: Anderson enrolled in Russell Richardson's social media training and began recording videos with her iPhone. Within three months, her content started gaining traction. By the six-to-eight-month mark, the sales leads followed.
Her videos give viewers a look at life inside a Cadillac dealership, with vehicle demonstrations and insights into the car-buying process.
The content has expanded her customer base well beyond Tennessee.
The business behind the following: Anderson told us that social media now generates a substantial share of her leads. She screens interested followers by asking them to email her or call the dealership, helping distinguish serious buyers from casual viewers.
Despite the explosive audience growth, she still sells roughly 20-plus cars monthly. The difference is her schedule. Anderson now leaves at 5 p.m. and keeps her weekends free to spend time with her 8-year-old son.
MARKETING
3. Members only?
Reddit just posted a $895 million quarter, up 53% from last year. But the platform has a problem… Google is sending it fewer visitors.
In its most recent shareholder letter, Reddit said search referrals were falling by more than 1 million per week on average during October. CEO Steve Huffman suspects Google's AI search features are contributing to the decline.
The plan: Reddit will begin testing a primarily login-only experience in selected markets outside the U.S. this quarter. The company told Axios that visitors arriving through search results or shared links should still be able to view the linked content.
There's a financial incentive, too. Logged-in and app users generate more than 80% of Reddit's monetization, and accounts give the platform better data for advertising.
Why it matters: Businesses relying on Reddit for organic discovery should watch how the changes affect search referrals and customer inquiries. The platform wants more direct relationships with users, which could change how brands reach customers there.
CONSUMER SPENDING
4. A split decision
Buy now, pay later (BNPL) is influencing more than how Americans pay. It's also affecting where some families choose to spend their money.
A new PYMNTS Intelligence study of 2,634 U.S. consumers found that 49% of single consumers with children said BNPL availability strongly influenced their choice of home-services provider. Another 47% said the same about medical and dental care.
The obvious: For households juggling regular expenses, splitting a purchase into smaller payments can make the timing more manageable.
Married consumers with children were three times as likely to have used BNPL in the previous three months as married consumers without children (15% versus 5%).
Why it matters: For business owners, particularly those selling expensive products or services, payment flexibility could influence customer acquisition. Offering installment options and making the terms visible before checkout is worth testing, especially as shoppers compare providers.
Read the full PYMNTS study (subscribers only)
FROM FREDDY
5. We should link up
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Stand With Adam Gaedke
Our VP of Dealer Services, Adam Gaedke, was in a serious accident in August that required spinal surgery. He’s now in rehab at Craig Hospital in Denver, one of the top spinal rehabilitation centers in the country.
Anyone who knows Adam knows he doesn’t do anything halfway. This is the guy who rides 150 miles on a Saturday for fun, and he’s bringing that same grit to his recovery every day.
Adam is also a devoted husband and dad. His wife, Lauren, and their boys, Arlo and Greer, are waiting for him at home in Kohler, Wisconsin. Now the family is facing major medical and recovery costs that insurance won’t cover.
It would mean a lot to me if you could contribute to Adam’s Help Hope Live campaign. Your donation is tax-deductible and goes directly toward the family’s uninsured expenses. Adam has shown up for so many of us in this industry. Now it’s our turn to show up for him.
Some links we think you’ll like
Here are some products we find useful and would encourage you to implement in your company.
Go High Level - A CRM and marketing tool that CRUSHES HubSpot. They are a day-one Freddy Media client, and now our business runs on it. This link gets you a 14-day free trial on us.
RFW Training - Learn how your company or brand can execute effective social media selling content.