Million Dollar Consulting is a practical and authoritative guide written by Alan Weiss, aimed at helping consultants build and grow their practices into million-dollar businesses. The book, now in its sixth edition, is updated to reflect modern business concerns and technologies. It provides step-by-step advice on raising capital, attracting clients, creating effective marketing strategies, and leveraging technology to reach a broader audience. Weiss emphasizes the importance of adopting a 'value mindset,' forming powerful alliances, and thinking globally. The book also covers topics such as firing non-beneficial clients, maximizing fees, and building a successful remote marketing model. It is designed for solo consultants, boutique owners, and aspiring partners in consulting firms, offering actionable tips and entrepreneurial insights to help them achieve significant financial success[2][4][5].
Amanda Natividad is VP of Marketing at SparkToro. She's also a contributor for Adweek, a Le Cordon Bleu-trained chef, and a former journalist. Dave and Amanda catch up after Amanda's return to work after having her second child, talk about trends they are seeing in B2B marketing today and what Amanda's seen work at SparkToro (including email strategy and LinkedIn). Plus they talk about the path to CMO - and why Amanda enjoys being a team of one.
Timestamps
- (00:00) - - Webinar Promotion Without Links and Returning to Work After Maternity Leave.
- (07:38) - - The Emotional Impact of Parental Leave.
- (10:14) - - Navigating Career Paths in Marketing.
- (13:44) - - SparkToro's Audience Research Tool and Growth Strategy.
- (16:05) - - VP of Marketing at SparkToro: Managing Top-of-Funnel, Organics, and Events.
- (20:45) - - Rethinking the pursuit of status in business.
- (23:44) - - Contemplating financial gains and their true value.
- (27:00) - - Prioritizing time over extra income for happiness.
- (33:16) - -Transitioning from Consulting to Content Business: The Evolution of Exit Five.
- (35:51) - - The challenges and potential rewards of solopreneurship.
- (38:06) - - Navigating Hiring and Trust in a Small Team
- (41:55) - - Strategic Email Marketing at Sparktoro: Balancing Frequency and Impact.
- (44:56) - - Sparktoro's Email Strategy: Quality over Quantity and List Management Tactics.
- (46:58) - - The challenge of balancing marketing strategies.
- (52:15) - - Optimizing LinkedIn Strategy: Pinning Comments and Zero-Click Content.
- (54:22) - - Embedding Webinar Links in Blog Posts for Engagement
- (56:43) - - Closing Thoughts
Send guest pitches and ideas to hi@exitfive.com
Join the Exit Five Newsletter here: https://www.exitfive.com/newsletter
Check out the Exit Five job board: https://jobs.exitfive.com/
Become an Exit Five member: https://community.exitfive.com/checkout/exit-five-membership
***
Today’s episode is brought to you by Zuddl.
We’re halfway through 2025, and one thing’s clear: events continue to be one of the highest performing marketing channels. Niche meetups, conferences, curated dinners, networking - you name it. Everyone’s leaning in.
Events are a core part of our playbook this year at Exit Five. So far, we’ve hosted two virtual sessions each month, one large virtual event, one in-person meetup, and we’re deep in the weeds planning our Drive conference coming back to Vermont this September.
Zuddl helps us run a smarter event strategy - from driving registrations, managing invites, automating comms, reminders, analytics, tracking. Their Salesforce integration also makes it simple to report on pipeline and revenue from events without pulling in ops.
On top of that, the differentiator with Zuddl is how their team is insanely good at supporting us. They always go above and beyond for us - and that’s how we’ve been able to keep the momentum going with 12+ events already this year, with plenty more to come.
If events are part of your marketing strategy, you need to look at Zuddl to see how companies like Zillow, CrowdStrike, and Iterable are using the top event platform for Business events in 2025.
Head over to zuddl.com/exitfive to learn more.
The Exit Five CMO Podcast (Hosted by Dave Gerhardt) 