Episode 13:Why Marketing Ops Is Your GTM Pit Crew and Not a Tech Helpdesk| Darrell Alfonso

Why Marketing Ops Is Your GTM Pit Crew — Not a Tech Helpdesk.

In this powerhouse episode, I’m joined by Darrell Alfonso, Director of Marketing Strategy & Operations at Indeed and one of the most respected voices in the global marketing ops community.

We dive deep into the evolving role of marketing ops, far beyond dashboards and tools. Darrell shares why ops should be the strategic backbone of GTM, how to architect a bowtie funnel that drives expansion revenue, and what most SaaS teams get completely wrong when evaluating new martech.

You’ll also hear Darrell’s take on:

• Why ABM tools alone won’t fix your GTM execution gap
• The pit crew vs race car analogy that every sales & marketing team needs to hear
• How to build a 5-person marketing ops team for $10M–$100M SaaS orgs
• What good ops looks like in an ABM motion and why most teams fail to align
• Why GTM leaders should obsess over outcomes, not just projects or tools

If you’ve invested in tools but still can’t tie them to a pipeline, then this episode will reshape how you approach marketing operations and tech in 2025.

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