Why We Started, What We’ve Learned, and Where We’re Going
Episode 001 is our origin story. We’re Harry and Daniel Hughes, two brothers from London who’ve spent the last decade deep in the world of lead generation, paid media and demand creation. From bootstrapping our first marketplace startup to running multi-million-pound campaigns across B2B and D2C, we’ve seen both the highs and the hard lessons of performance marketing.
This episode sets the stage for Unqualified Leads. We share why we’ve launched the podcast, the gaps we see in today’s marketing conversations, and what listeners can expect as the series unfolds. You’ll hear the differences in how we approach growth, one of us leaning towards the creative and branding side, the other obsessed with data, operations and clean attribution, and how those perspectives combine to shape how we run campaigns today.
But more importantly, we outline what this show is really about: cutting through the noise and replacing buzzwords with practical, real-world experience. No gatekeeping, no theory for theory’s sake. Just transparent discussions about what works, what doesn’t, and how to move from “leads” to actual revenue.
If you’re a founder, marketer or agency leader tired of cookie-cutter playbooks and generic advice, this is the starting point. Welcome to Unqualified Leads.
Transcript
In the first episode of Unqualified Leads, Daniel and I sat down to explain why we’re starting this podcast, what we’ve learned building demand systems in B2B and B2C, and why the industry needs more transparency.
The truth? Marketing looks polished on LinkedIn, but behind the scenes even big companies are still struggling with the basics. Accounts are messy, tracking is broken, and campaigns chase vanity metrics rather than revenue.
That’s exactly what we’re tackling in this series: the messy, unfiltered reality of scaling demand.
Here are a few of the big themes we covered in Episode 001:
The gap between theory and practice → why textbook marketing rarely works in the wild.
Pipeline over vanity → how chasing traffic without conversions kills growth.
Foundations first → why the unglamorous setup work matters more than the shiny campaign.
Lessons from failure → where we’ve screwed up, and how that shaped our approach.
Why we’re doing this → holding ourselves accountable to share 100 episodes of unfiltered insights.
If you’re a founder, marketer, or agency owner who’s sick of hearing the same recycled playbooks, this podcast is for you. We’ll break down the strategies, systems, and experiments that actually drive revenue, with nothing left off the table.
Unfiltered Leads – Episode 001 Highlights
Launching a podcast isn’t about chasing clicks or building vanity metrics. For us, *Unfiltered Leads* is about accountability, honesty, and sharing the lessons we’ve learned the hard way. In this first episode, we set the stage: who we are, why this show exists, and what listeners can expect as we grow. Here are the big themes that came out of the conversation.
Why We Started Unqualified Leads
Most marketing content online feels polished, safe, and carefully edited to present success. That’s not how real campaigns work. Behind the scenes, even big companies have messy ad accounts, broken tracking, and shaky foundations. We wanted to share the side of marketing most people avoid talking about, the mistakes, the chaos, and the things that really move the needle.
The Gap Between Theory and Reality
There’s a huge difference between what gets taught in textbooks or LinkedIn posts and what actually works in practice. Theory says: build perfect funnels, follow frameworks, optimise every step. Reality says: you’re dealing with incomplete data, messy CRM records, and clients who want results yesterday. It’s that tension, between the ideal and the reality that shaped our careers.
Pipeline Over Vanity Metrics
One of the biggest lessons we’ve learned is that traffic and impressions mean nothing if they don’t drive pipeline. Leads are easy. Qualified opportunities are hard. And if you can’t track opportunities through to revenue, you’re not doing demand gen, you’re just buying clicks. That’s why we always push beyond lead generation to focus on closed-won deals.
Foundations Before Campaigns
It’s tempting to dive into flashy creative or scale ad spend quickly. But the unglamorous setup work, CRM integration, data hygiene, attribution, is what separates campaigns that scale from those that burn out. In almost every account we’ve audited, the same problems pop up: broken tracking, no lead scoring, unclear handoff from marketing to sales. Fix those first, and everything else gets easier.
Lessons From Failure
Some of our biggest breakthroughs came from campaigns that didn’t work. Failed launches, wasted ad spend, bad messaging, painful at the time, but they forced us to rebuild stronger systems. It’s those unfiltered lessons that make the difference, and they’ll be a constant theme throughout the podcast.
Accountability and Consistency
This podcast isn’t just for the audience, it’s also for us. We’re holding ourselves accountable to share 100 episodes of insights, not just highlight reels. By documenting the journey, we’ll create a living playbook of what it actually takes to build high-performance demand systems.
If you’re a founder, marketer, or agency owner tired of recycled advice, *Unfiltered Leads* is for you. We’ll be breaking down the strategies, systems, and lessons we’ve learned, with nothing off-limits. Welcome to Episode 001.