Ever sunk thousands into SEO with zero return? Or been ghosted after a pitch you poured your soul into? In this episode, LinkedIn Top Voice and sales trainer Niraj Kapoor joins Chris Norton to unpack the brutal truths of modern selling. From reducing ghosting and building trust on LinkedIn to coping with rejection and learning from failure, this conversation is packed with practical advice and raw honesty.

Niraj shares his journey from starting in sales with nothing to becoming a TEDx speaker and bestselling author, plus the painful lessons learned along the way. If you want to stand out in an AI-driven world, sell without sounding desperate, and avoid costly mistakes, this episode is your playbook. Tune in for strategies, stories, and a reminder that being human is still the ultimate competitive edge.

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Former marketing manager at Prolific North, Natalie Davidson, once accidentally invited 100 people to the wrong day of an event due to a rogue automatic reminder. She discovered the mistake while in the middle of briefing a speaker and was unable to access her laptop for an hour, causing major stress. Miraculously, no one showed up early. Either attendees remembered the correct date or no one had read the email. I did my best to reassure her it was probably the former.

In this episode, we explore professional mistakes and failures that marketing professionals can learn from, offering listeners real-world examples of blunders and recoveries. Natalie shares two honest and revealing stories from her career in events management, showing how even the most organised professionals can make serious errors and still recover with integrity and resilience.

• Forgetting to book an afternoon session for 30 people during a nationwide roadshow of events
• Successfully recovering from the booking error by being honest with the venue and leveraging a good professional relationship
• Setting up automatic event reminders for the wrong day, sending incorrect information to around 100 attendees
• Managing crisis situations while actively engaged in other critical tasks
• Finding humor in professional mistakes and using them as learning opportunities

Is your strategy still right for 2026? Book a free 15-min discovery call to get tailored insights to boost your brand’s growth. 👉 [Book your call with Chris now] 👈

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Mark Terry Lush spent thirty years chasing every opportunity. Big brands, wild projects, new cultures, he said yes to them all. The problem was that adaptability started to feel like progress, and it cost him focus on his own brand.

In this episode, Mark shares what he learned from building everyone else’s success while neglecting his own. We talk about why versatility without direction can derail your career, how brands fall into the sea of sameness, and why personality matters more than features.

He also tells a flying story that will make you rethink risk and resilience. If you’ve ever felt like you’re busy but not moving forward, this conversation will help you find clarity and build something that lasts.

Is your strategy still right for 2026? Book a free 15-min discovery call to get tailored insights to boost your brand’s growth. 👉 [Book your call with Chris now] 👈

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Writer and freelance marketing expert Sarah Townsend joined the show on episode 43; she shared a set of moments from her career that are equal parts chaotic and unforgettable

She talks about shouting “Look, a heron!” in the middle of a live training session and leaving her suitcase on the wrong train while travelling to a major conference. The most painful moment arrives when she reveals the mistake that cost her twenty thousand pounds after forgetting to invoice a client for ten full months. Sarah explains how ADHD influenced many of these chaotic moments and reflects on what each incident taught her about staying organised, keeping communication clear, and maintaining reliable systems.

If you have ever felt embarrassed by an oversight or worried that you are the only one dropping the ball, this episode shows that every marketer makes mistakes and that each fail comes with a valuable lesson.

Click on the link to listen to the full episode 43:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2206375/episodes/15707196

Is your strategy still right for 2026? Book a free 15-min discovery call to get tailored insights to boost your brand’s growth. 👉 [Book your call with Chris now] 👈

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A single missing gesture can set the internet alight. We open up about a day when Royal Mail faced a fast-moving backlash over Paralympics stamps and how a quiet policy gap looked like a loud value judgment on social media. From the first surge of tweets to the uncomfortable hours stuck in monitoring mode, we walk through what happens when your team lacks the tools, approvals, and scripts to respond at the speed of the timeline.

You’ll hear how the narrative formed in real time: honour given to Olympians, absence for Paralympians, and a rush of anger that framed the issue as dignity denied. We unpack why silence isn’t neutral, why a clear holding statement can stabilise a story, and how early Twitter’s velocity made every minute count. Along the way, we get practical about social listening, crisis playbooks, and the small operational choices, like pre-approved templates and escalation paths that create big advantages when things go sideways.

We also talk about brand symbolism and equity. Commemorative stamps seem simple, but they carry cultural weight, and unequal treatment reads as exclusion. That’s why policy stress testing matters: diverse eyes, scenario planning, and checks for unintentional bias before a campaign goes live. If you work in comms, marketing, or customer care, you’ll find clear takeaways you can implement today: set up the tech stack, define who can speak when, rehearse the response flow, and protect your team with debriefs that turn chaos into learning.

If this conversation helps sharpen your crisis plan, follow the show, share it with a teammate, and leave a quick review telling us the one change you’ll make this week.

Is your strategy still right for 2026? Book a free 15-min discovery call to get tailored insights to boost your brand’s growth. 👉 [Book your call with Chris now] 👈

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When Lisa, co-founder of Common People and strategist at Wavemaker Manchester, accidentally misbooked an out-of-home campaign linked to a BBC event, it was more than an embarrassing blunder back in episode 41.

It became the moment she started questioning who really gets to thrive in advertising and media. In this episode, Lisa recounts that campaign mishap, a chaotic run of travel mix-ups, a painful pitch-room tumble, and the day she ended up crying at her desk. She then connects those experiences to a bigger issue: how class, confidence and unspoken office rules quietly shut working-class people out of the industry. Lisa shares practical ideas for change, from dropping unnecessary degree requirements and paying real living wages to simplifying recruitment tasks and making workplace norms explicit.

This is a candid, funny and insightful conversation for marketers who want more relatable teams, smarter campaigns and fewer people feeling like they don’t belong.

Click here to listen to the full episode 41.

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What happens when you drop £30,000 on an influencer and the sign-ups never show?

In this episode of Embracing Marketing Mistakes, Andy Lambert, co-founder of ContentCal, author of Spheres of Influence and now Principal Manager of Product at Adobe Express, unpacks two costly growth errors: overinvesting in performance ads and running a transactional influencer campaign that barely moved the needle.

Andy explains why demand capture can look like growth until it suddenly stops, and how “pilot” influencer tests often fail because trust is not built in a week. He shares the practical reset that followed: tighter audience focus, creators who genuinely use the product, stronger community signals, and personality-led brand building that supports revenue over time.

If your paid media efficiency is slipping, your influencer spend feels underwhelming, or you are trying to rebalance brand and demand, this episode will help you avoid the same expensive mistakes.

Is your strategy still right for 2026? Book a free 15-min discovery call to get tailored insights to boost your brand’s growth. 👉 [Book your call with Chris now] 👈

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When Director of Thinking and Creative PR Specialist Peter Freedman joined us for this episode 39, he unpacked the unusual marketing mistake he made while working with Craigslist.

Tasked with satirising the rise of in-your-face shirt sponsorships, Peter sponsored a women’s football team in Battersea Park and put them in full advertising sandwich boards. The stunt was pretty clever, photogenic and completely impractical, yet it barely registered with any journalists.

One even called it the most peculiar idea they had ever seen. Peter explains why the campaign fell flat, how it was simply too weird and not familiar enough, and what he learned from books like The Creative Curve and Contagious about the sweet spot between novelty and recognition.

Marketers will hear a candid breakdown of why some ideas stay niche, why moderate innovation works better than pure shock value, and how to judge whether your next PR concept is different in the right way.

Click here to listen to the full episode.

Is your strategy still right for 2026? Book a free 15-min discovery call to get tailored insights to boost your brand’s growth. 👉 [Book your call with Chris now] 👈

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