Past
Marketers collected a few reviews and quotes and put the best ones on the website.
ACADEMY · FOUND · BE THE ANSWER WHEN THEY LOOK
Learn FOUND-O: Opinions
Do credible users and communities back us?
Measured by: Verified reviews, community sentiment, recency of third-party evidence. · Owner: your CMO
Four steps: read the letter, read the lenses, take the self-assessment, then pick one or two gaps. All learning paths.
Free. No sign-in. Nothing you answer is stored.
Treat reviews and community voice as the brand's reputation ('what people say when you are not…
Listen first: read customer and community language to learn what buyers actually care about, th…
Statements are from this letter's self-assessment. Nothing is pre-filled and nothing is stored.
PAST AND FUTURE
FOUND-O: the story in two lines
Marketers will work differently with agents. This is what changes for this letter, and what stays with a person.
Present to future
Buyers and AI assistants read what users say on neutral platforms and in communities. The job becomes to know what is said there, reply truthfully, and fix what is true.
What the agent does
Maps the review sites and communities that matter, records what is said and how recent it is, and drafts replies and requests marked draft.
What the marketer or CMO decides
Whether to ask a customer for a review, how to reply, and what to fix in the product or service. Reviews are never written, bought or edited by us.
Shifts used here: S2 From talking about ourselves to amplifying neutral voices; S6 From attribution software alone to self-reported answers and simple signals. Read the full framework and sources.
1. What the agent does
Agents check, draft, map and record. A person approves anything that leaves the company.
- Load inputs and verify evidence from the prior cycle is intact.
- Measure the letter's metrics (Verified reviews, community sentiment, recency of third-party evidence) using deterministic calculation; LLMs may classify and draft rationales only.
- Compare to last cycle and flag deltas and anomalies.
- Draft the fixes or assets for the gaps found.
- Package findings with citations and confidence.
- Submit to the strategist for approval, then hand off.
Where a person approves
- Strategist approves decision-grade findings and anything published or sent externally.
- Review requests, analyst briefings and outreach are sent only by a human or after explicit approval.
- Agents never create or buy reviews, testimonials, analyst opinions, awards or other third-party validation.
Maturity scale (FOUND): Invisible, Detectable, Considered, Preferred, Category reference. Full letter page
2. The leader lens
How other well-regarded B2B marketing leaders would approach this letter, each named with a source. These are their opinions, not evidence about any company, and none of them has a relationship with Foundronics.
How to apply
- L17 (Booth): Treat community evidence as a long-term asset: record which communities exist, who staffs them and whether they run on trust. Never draft outreach that pitches in a community.
- L13 (Verna): Prefer real employee, customer and builder voices over brand-account posts when proposing evidence to gather. Draft requests for honest feedback only; the strategist sends them.
- L16 (Frost, HubSpot): Check which review platforms and forums AI answers already cite; list gaps in verified, recent third-party evidence there (secondhand source, so confirm against the actual answers).
A person decides: the strategist approves which leader-lens suggestions are used; agents draft and check only.
Sources for this lens
- L17. Community is a long-term brand strategy, not a three-month pipeline play. It needs dedicated people, a model that fits the goal, and in-person trust. The source is an interviewer’s summary. Source (from a third party’s summary; check before quoting)
- L13. Growth is now a trust problem. Employee voices, creators who truly match your audience, and staffed community build trust. This is her opinion, not a study. Source
- L16. Publish the exact answer to the exact buyer question, answer first, and earn mentions on sources that AI tools already cite. HubSpot’s recap of a talk; its result claims are not used. Source (from a third party’s summary; check before quoting)
3. The CMO lens
What a good B2B CMO would do for this letter. The lens follows the public writing of Dave Gerhardt. It is our reading, not his endorsement of Foundronics.
What a great CMO would do
- Treat reviews and community voice as the brand's reputation ('what people say when you are not in the room'), earned by customer experience, never manufactured.
- Listen first: read customer and community language to learn what buyers actually care about, then bring it back to positioning.
- Make it easy and honest for happy customers to speak, via requests a human sends.
A weekly rhythm
- Mon: refresh verified review and community sentiment snapshot.
- Tue: cluster themes in customer language; flag recency gaps.
- Wed: draft human-sent review and community requests and thank-you notes (`draft`).
- Thu: strategist picks which customers to approach personally.
- Fri: log sends and replies; hand themes to FOUND-U.
An example
Hypothetical (CrowdStrike, illustration only): the agent notices recent third-party evidence is thin for one use case. It drafts a short personal note for the strategist to send to a few customers who have said positive things, asking for an honest review, with no incentive wording.
What to avoid
- Never create, buy, incentivise or script reviews or testimonials.
- Do not automate replies in communities; a human shows up.
- Do not pick only the kind words.
- Do not ignore negative themes.
A person decides: Which customers to approach, in what words, and how to respond to criticism. Agents draft and check; the strategist decides.
Sources for this lens
- P3. Do things that do not scale. Talk to customers directly, one by one. Source
- P7. Keep to the fundamentals: know your customer, use simple direct language, give value before asking, be transparent, measure what matters, and earn word of mouth. Source
- P9. Channels that build up over time often do not show in attribution. Ask customers how they found you. Source
4. Check yourself
A free self-assessment for FOUND-O. It takes a few minutes and needs no sign-in.
Take the FOUND-O self-assessment
The examples on this page are hypothetical illustrations. A named company is an example of a type, never a customer or partner of Foundronics.
Next: FOUND-U Underdog Moves · All learning paths · Foundronics Certified (roadmap)
Know the letter? Now score your own company.
The FOUND Score is free and needs no login.