ON AIR: With Owen & Josh

Introducing episode 1 of the new season of ON AIR: With Owen & Josh – the podcast where two founders who’ve done their time in the sales trenches share refreshingly honest insights on what genuinely moves the needle when scaling revenue.

Meet Your Hosts: Owen Richards and Josh Smith

Owen Richards hails from Kent and began his sales career at Forrest Marketing Group (now Forrest Contact) in Sydney. After an 8-year stint, Owen returned to the UK and co-founded Air Marketing Group, growing it into a powerhouse offering specialist B2B sales and marketing solutions to businesses across the globe. Known for his relentless positivity and strategic foresight, Owen brings a wealth of experience and a knack for big ideas to the podcast.

Joshua Smith is the founder of CRO Connected, a fast-growing network on a mission to democratise the insight and experience Chief Revenue Officers need to scale. From startup scrappiness to boardroom strategy, Josh has seen the full spectrum on his professional journey. He brings sharp commercial acumen and a dry wit to the podcast, fuelled by a real-world understanding of what it takes to build, lead, and scale.

What to Expect in this Episode

In our very first episode, Owen is joined by Adam Philpott (CEO, Fingerprints). With co-host Josh unexpectedly out of action, the conversation doesn’t hold back. From leading sales in global enterprises to transforming sales operations in a small business, Adam shares unfiltered insight from both sides of the scale spectrum.

Together, Owen and Adam explore:

• What it really means to professionalise sales in SMBs
• The key differences between enterprise and startup sales culture
• Building sales processes without stifling individuality
• Balancing operational rigour with entrepreneurial flair
• Why forecasting is not about reading the news—but creating it

This is an honest, sharp-edged chat for sales leaders, founders, and revenue professionals who want more than the same recycled advice.

New episodes drop monthly – subscribe and follow the journey as we speak to the experts who are actually doing the work.

Watch: On YouTube or via Air Marketing’s Knowledge Hub.

Listen: On Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, TuneIn + Alexa, Deezer, and more.

Warning: Contains swearing

Our 80th guest is Arden Styles, CCO at CEGEN Environmental Group.
Owen and Arden have a discussion around discovering the true essence of a brand.

Including:
– What ‘brand essence’ means and why it’s important
– Real life examples of brand essence
– How brand essence can represent much more than the product you are selling
– How brand essence works in a B2B environment
– Increasing the degree of certainty: what it means and why it’s important for your clients
– How to define the essence of your brand, and at what stage it should be done
– Aligning a personal brand with an organisation’s brand, and the part digital presence plays
– The know, like, trust funnel
– The types of content a marketer should be producing to promote the essence of the brand
– Real life examples of marketing campaigns that have done this effectively

Our 79th guest is Adam Graham, Managing Director at Gray Matters and Founder of BD Matters.
Owen and Adam discuss the topic of diagnosing the root cause of sales inefficiency and offer practical solutions to address it.
Including:
– Most common factors behind sales underperformance
– The ideal mindset and culture of a leadership team
– Common mistakes vs quick wins of positioning and branding
– Pros and cons of being niche and the internal challenges that brings
– Getting buy-in from your sales team
– Go-to-market strategy: what’s working and what’s not in 2023

Our 78th guest is David Allison, Founder of The Valuegraphics Project.
Owen and David discuss how tapping into customers core values can unlock the ability to understand them on a deeper level and influence them more effectively.

Including:

– The difference between demographics and valuegraphics
– How to use valuegraphics effectively
– The concept of humans being values-driven
– 3 key questions to ask your potential customers to reveal their core values
– Getting to the ‘why’
– Demographic dominance
– How old habits need to change around targeting your ideal customer
– The most common values from around the world

Our 76th guest is Dale Dupree, Founder & CSO of The Sales Rebellion.
Owen and Dale discuss how to ‘sell more and suck less’.

Including:
– An introduction to Dale and The Sales Rebellion
– How to stand out as an SDR in a crowded market
– The ideal traits and skills of a high performing SDR
– Advice for dealing with rejection, failure and lack of confidence
– Most common things that sales reps do which ‘suck’
– The importance of humanising your sales strategy
– The Sales Rebellion’s ‘R.E.A.S.O.N.’ theory