State of Play · Q2 2026

Audience built.
Now converting.

Q2 2026 Review · Apr 1 – Jun 30 · RivrHub × KungPow Marketing

161

Days to EOY 2026

The Master Plan · January 2026

Recap: the three major solutions we're driving for.

Solution 01

More leads, easier sold at trade shows.

Solution 02

A new, scalable, repeatable source of deal flow.

Solution 03

Owned assets and reputation that last for years to come.

Act I · Proof — Solution 01

The booth is warming.

27%

Q1 · 20 of 75 leads

→

50%

Q2 · 9 of 18 leads

Share of trade-show leads with a LinkedIn touch from our outreach before the lead ever existed in Pipedrive.

Half of Q2's trade-show leads already knew us before they reached the booth. The outbound motion is doing exactly what Solution 01 promised.

Act I · Proof

Fewer leads. More meetings.

Q1 2026

Expo West · Global Pet · Fancy Food

Trade show leads75

Marketing influenced2027%

Qualified meetings ✱34%

Q2 2026

Sweets & Snacks · Shop Talk

Trade show leads18

Marketing influenced950%

Meetings held ✱633%

✱ Final meeting & pipeline figures land with this week's Pipedrive reconciliation — this room gets verified numbers only. Full flagged detail in the leave-behind.

Act I · What we built — Solution 02

48% of the universe, touched.

Outreach alone — 5,651 good-fit brands

Decision-makers identified7,195

Reached with outreach3,475 · 48%

Connected on LinkedIn in 2026729

In active conversation150

+ The Pipedrive base

1,678

Organizations

984

People

Full Sniper-Sheet re-reconciliation in progress: every existing deal and contact updated this week with Walter's complete email history — exact status of every lead, and who's a deal worth refreshing.

If 10% qualify → ≈150 brands with established history — a second pool of Q3/Q4 meetings. Firm count in days.

Reach is no longer the constraint. Converting 150 open conversations — and reviving the Pipedrive base — is what Q3 is built to do.

Act I · What we built — Solution 03

1,000+ qualified contacts.

~50

Start of 2026

→

1,000+

RivrHub Report list · on Beehiiv

EOY goal clearedtarget was 500

New in the flywheel this quarter · +30 positive target accounts (150 all-time)

Mark Anthony Group White Claw · VP Marketing Kraft Heinz Ingredients Sr. Natl. Acct Mgr Utz Brands Walmart BD Cibo Vita · Nature's Garden VP Global Biz Dev Stellar Snacks EVP Sales Woodstock Farms Dir. of Sales JUNKLESS Foods VP Marketing Every Body Eat VP Sales Enstrom Candies Marketing Dir. Alter Eco CEO +22 more Q2 replies

These aren't impressions. Named decision-makers at brands you know — reachable any week we choose.

Act II · The Honest Scorecard

Hits and misses. The website blocks.

Cleared

Report audience 1,000+ vs 500 EOY goal — 2×
Newsletter rebuilt — Beehiiv, new template, first send live

Healthy

+30 positive target accounts in Q2 · 150 all-time
Trade-show influence 50% — doubled QoQ
Van Holten's case study delivered

Behind — one cause

Blogs 0 of 45 published · 30 written & banked
Branded search 90/mo vs 150 goal
Organic 100/mo, down from 127
Post cadence 20/60 personal · 9/20 company

We wrote 30 blogs and published zero — there's nowhere to put them yet. Production never stopped; distribution was gated on the website. That gate opens in Q3.

Act III · What turns on

Q2 was assembly.
Q3 is activation.

Until the BDR seat is filled, marketing carries every account from first touch to sales-ready conversation — Josh enters when fit and intent are clear.

1Pipedrive as Source of Truth 2Website HQ 3Content Engine 4LinkedIn Relationship Engine 5Deal Refresh

The Machine · 1 of 5 — Pipedrive as Source of Truth

Pipedrive: every account, every signal, one screen.

Today — the Sniper Sheet lives in spreadsheets

Company	Contact	Stage	Touches	Last touch
Kraft Heinz Ingredients	M. D'Alesandro	Positive reply	4	4/30
Mark Anthony Group	O. Gololobova	Positive reply	1	6/26
Utz Brands	H. Friedman	Connected	2	5/2
Alter Eco	K. Bearden	Positive reply	5	5/1

ABM Master · 9,139 records · 34 fields · updated Jul 21 Open the ABM Master Sheet ↗

End of Q3 — all of it in Pipedrive

One record per account

Every decision-maker and influencer at every Sniper Sheet account.

Every signal, live

Comments, replies, likes, website visits, downloads — flowing in as they happen.

Real-time reporting dashboard

Gets the new BDR up to speed as fast as humanly possible — and powers our own reporting.

No conversation goes cold. Nothing we learn is ever lost — and the new BDR inherits all of it on day one.

The Machine · 2 of 5 — Webflow rebuild

The website: not a redesign, an HQ.

Publishing architecture for up to 30 high-quality pieces per month

Day one of launch: the 30 banked blogs go live. The content engine finally has a home.

AI brand-audit tools — built by Josh, integrated with RivrHub Insights

A working product demo as lead generation: prospects audit their brand, we capture the signal.

Enterprise-grade scaffolding

The presence that attracts both the clients we want and the talent we'll hire.

Every "Behind" on the scorecard routes through this launch. It's the single highest-leverage ship of the year.

The Machine · 3 of 5 — Content Engine 1.0

One source of truth. An entire month of useful content.

Inputs

First-party knowledge

RivrHub operating knowledge
Brand-owner pains & sales objections
Marketplace data, changes & deadlines
Expert interviews — Josh, Stephen & Matt
Ahrefs search demand & content gaps
Approved case studies, proof & customer stories

→

Content Engine 1.0

Every piece runs the gauntlet

Select topic & audience
Assemble a source packet
Draft from first-party evidence
Fact-check every claim
Apply Josh's voice
Run confidentiality review
Optimize for SEO, AEO & internal links
Score, revise & approve

→

Outputs

Counted monthly

30-blog V1 proof build — launch inventory
20 Josh LinkedIn posts / mo
4 LinkedIn articles / mo — weekly
2 newsletter sends / mo
4–7 company-page posts / mo
1 flagship report or major asset / qtr — State of Grocery (Q3)

Open the Content Calendar ↗ · Notion

The Machine · 4 & 5 of 5

Every prospect nurtured. Every old deal reopened.

4 · Josh's LinkedIn Relationship Engine

MonOperator point of view — the stance: what Josh believes

TueUseful numbers — margin math, marketplace economics, deadlines

WedHuman & relatable — a mistake, a hard decision, an honest lesson

ThuProof — a result, teardown, case-study excerpt, screenshot

FriConversation — a question, prediction, thoughtful disagreement

24/7Always-on nurture — notified when any of the 150 posts · comments in the window that matters · DMs on their clock, every touch logged. The behavior that moved influence 27% → 50%.

The post creates the opening. Comments & DMs build the relationship. Pipedrive records the next action.

5 · Deal Refresh

474 archived · 233 active leads · 67 deals mapped

Every lead and connection ever sent gets a LinkedIn touch → Pipedrive drip.

Top 50 stalled deals first

Van Ness $7.2M — presentation completed, went quiet · Rigoni di Asiago $1.1M · Pez Candy (values per Pipedrive records).

Proof it works: Iconic Candy's dead lead re-created itself in June after our May touch.

Blog & SEO insight → Josh's interpretation → conversation → website intent → Pipedrive → qualified call

Hold us to this · The build order, Q3 → Q4

Recommended order of operations.

First

Establish visibility

Recover Walter's deal & lead context
Consolidate the target-account universe
Decide the Pipedrive marketing pipeline structure
Make "next action" mandatory
Confirm what PostHog currently tracks
Define which website behavior feeds Pipedrive

Second

Lock Content Engine 1.0

Approve the five pillars
Finalize the weekly LinkedIn matrix
Create the first-party insight template
Schedule the expert interviews
Define the AI production workflow
Build the first four-week content batch
Finalize The Current template

Third

Launch consistent publishing & engagement

Begin the five-day Josh calendar
Publish the first full newsletter
Publish one weekly article
Maintain company-page publishing
Run daily engagement
Start a CEO / founder account sprint

Fourth

Add nurture & proof

Activate the trade-show & re-nurture sequences
Publish the VH case study
Launch the audit CTA
Begin the teardown format
Make proof assets available for DM conversations

Fifth

Connect behavior to action

Feed PostHog intent into known account records
Produce a target-account warmth dashboard
Review the warm-account queue weekly
Route sales-ready conversations to Josh & Matt
Measure which content & actions produce qualified discussions

161 days to EOY — visibility first, then content, then publishing, then proof, then behavior-driven action. Full data & sources: the State of Play dashboard follows as the leave-behind.

Requests

One standing hour a month.

01 · Standing meeting — Operational Leaders (Josh, Matt & Stephen)

Once per month · 60 min · the machine's operating review: pipeline conversion, content engine, Pipedrive reporting.

Pick any time that works — live openings, August onward · all times ET · each becomes the recurring slot

Mon · Aug 3

10:00 AM

= 1st Monday, monthly

Tue · Aug 4

4:00 PM

= 1st Tuesday, monthly

Wed · Aug 5

9:00 AM

= 1st Wednesday, monthly

Thu · Aug 6

11:00 AM

= 1st Thursday, monthly

Fri · Aug 7

2:00 PM

= 1st Friday, monthly

See all times ↗

Appendix A · Channel detail — if asked

Channels: growing reach, sharper audience.

LinkedIn — Josh

Followers1,994 +26% QoQ

New in Q2+408

Impressions (Apr 1–Jul 20)23,321 +119%

Posts20 goal 60

Top post ("margin haircut from Amazon") → 3 DM conversations with target-fit operators.

LinkedIn — Company

Followers480 +42.5%

Engagements98 +85%

Impressions3,409 +8%

Posts9 goal 20

Engagement growing 10× faster than reach — the right audience is following. Top post: Stephen Teafatiller announcement, 13.26% engagement.

Search — GSC, QoQ

Clicks285 −21%

Impressions3,950 +15%

Avg position7.0 Q1: 4.4

Branded / mo90 goal 150

Visibility broadening, rankings soft — 90 days with zero new content. Recovery = launch + 30-blog backlog.

Follower and impression counts are channel health, not business outcomes — the business metrics are meetings, accounts, and pipeline.

Appendix B · Meetings & pitches detail — pending reconciliation

Meeting evidence ✱ — do not quote as final.

Q1 · 3 meetings — all marketing-influenced

Calyan Wax · pitch completed 5/20$1.7M

Vermont Meats$2.8M

Big Tree Farms · Jan touch → Mar meeting$1.4M

Panos Brands · pitched ✱$3.1M

Q2 · 6 meetings ✱ · 2 pitched

Puroast Coffee · Shop Talk floor · influenced$2.7M

Meiji America · S&S floor$2.0M

Mariani · call 4/23$1.3M

Sunfood Superfoods · agreement drafting 5/26$1.0M

Otafuku Foods · ~5/13$930K

Miracle Fruit Oil · late May—

✱ All Q2 figures pending Pipedrive reconciliation this week. Teal border = marketing-influenced (LinkedIn touch predates lead creation). Sources: trade-show lead sheet · outreach workbooks · deals CSV · Q1 State of Play.

Audience built.Now converting.