By 
Shreyas M V · Published · 13 min read
From Google+ to Clubhouse: Why Founders Over-Invest in New Channels
Founders over-invest in new channels because the advice they find is a list of options with no rule for when to stop spending on one. The fix is a test-before-commit rule: write the brief, cap the spend and set a kill line before the first post, ad or event. The rule is Kanso's own design, assembled from three published guides, and it has not been trialled.
Why do founders over-invest in new marketing channels?
Founders over-invest in new marketing channels because the guidance they find is a long menu of channels with almost no rule for when to stop spending on one. A commitment of money, time or people then arrives before any evidence that the channel returns more than it costs. This page offers that explanation and a rule to counter it, and it does not measure how often founders actually do this.
- The three top-ranking guides read for this page list channels and selection criteria. Each mentions testing, and none, in the text extracted, sets a spend cap, a time limit or a stop rule.
- The test-before-commit rule has five steps: write the brief, cap the spend and time, run a small test, read it against the brief, and raise the commitment one step at a time.
- A short test sees only the buyers who are ready now. Madison Logic, citing LinkedIn's 95-5 Rule, puts that at about 5% of B2B buyers at any moment.
- Google+ and Clubhouse appear in the title as shorthand. The evidence for this page holds no sourced history of either, so the page does not retell them.
What does this page say about Google+ and Clubhouse?
This page says almost nothing about the two platforms themselves, and that is deliberate. The title uses their names as shorthand for a kind of channel: a new network that attracts attention before anyone has measured what it returns.
The research behind this page contains no primary source on either one. It therefore states no dates, user numbers or reasons for what happened to them, and a reader who wants those histories should start from the companies' own announcements and dated news reporting, which this page has not checked.
What the page can support is the decision problem the names stand for. That problem is how to treat a channel nobody on your team has measured yet.
What is documented here and what is Kanso's analysis?
The sources document what three guides and four public threads say about choosing and testing channels, and everything about why founders over-invest is Kanso's analysis. The two lists keep that line visible.
Documented, as read on 5 November 2026
- Salesforce's channel guide lists testing as one of five tips for choosing channels: run small test campaigns, then analyse conversion rate, cost per acquisition and engagement.
- Coursera's guide, updated 5 May 2026, asks how much you need to spend to generate data on how ads perform, and says to raise the budget once revenue and data exist.
- Madison Logic reports from its own survey that seven in ten B2B marketers are seeking new channels, and suggests a pilot before wider use of connected TV.
- The same Madison Logic page, citing LinkedIn's 95-5 Rule, says only about 5% of B2B buyers are actively in market at any given time.
- Four recent Reddit threads in r/DigitalMarketing and r/AskMarketing ask which channel to bet on and which one converts. They keep returning to two problems: advice that goes stale, and measuring results across tools.
Analysis, not established fact
- Founders commit early because channel lists reward breadth and give no price for the attention each channel takes.
- A test needs three things written down before it starts: a spend cap, a time box and a kill line.
- Commitment should rise in steps, each with its own written criteria.
- Every threshold in this essay is for you to set, because no source read for this page supports a number.
What does the advice that ranks for new marketing channels tell you?
It tells you to list channels, match them to your audience and budget, and test, but the three guides read for this page treat testing as a line or two and not as a procedure. The table sets out what each says and what its extracted text leaves out.
| Guide | What it recommends | What it says about testing | Not in the extracted text |
|---|---|---|---|
| Salesforce | 12 channel types, then five selection tips: goals, audience, budget, competitors, test | Run small test campaigns, then compare conversion rate, cost per acquisition and engagement | How small, how long, and what result ends the test |
| Coursera (updated 5 May 2026) | Channel examples, then six steps: goals, market analysis, competitors, customer interviews, budget, multiple channels | Asks how much you must spend to generate performance data, and says to raise the budget once revenue and data exist | A spend cap, a time limit and a stop rule |
| Madison Logic | Five channels for B2B account-based marketing: influencers, connected TV, podcasts, webinars, video | Run a pilot on connected TV before wider use; for podcasts, track ad recall, landing-page visits and brand perception | What pilot result would end the experiment |
These guides define channels for a broad reader, so the gap is understandable. For a founder it still matters, because a test with no stop rule tends to turn into a standing commitment.
That last sentence is analysis. The table is observation of what three pages say, and it covers only these three.
How should you read a survey that says marketers want new channels?
Read it as a report of what marketers plan to spend on, not as evidence that any channel returns more than it costs. Madison Logic presents the figures below as the result of its own survey of B2B marketers, and names Harris Poll as the survey firm for its podcast figure.
| Figure as reported | What it measures | What it does not measure |
|---|---|---|
| 60% planning to invest in social media advertising | A stated plan to spend | Whether that spend paid back |
| 60% planning to invest in AI tools | A stated plan to spend | Whether any channel or tool improved results |
| 53% planning to invest in video content | A stated plan to spend | Cost per customer from video |
| 50% prioritizing podcast advertising | A stated priority | Sales from podcast ads |
| Seven in ten seeking new and innovative channels | Appetite for new channels | Which new channels worked |
| 64% advertising on consumer-focused platforms such as TikTok and Instagram | A reported mindset and practice | Conversion from those platforms |
Intent to spend is the number that climbs when a channel becomes fashionable. Return on spend is what a test measures, and a survey of plans cannot supply it.
The survey also covers B2B marketers only, so a consumer founder should not read it as a map of their market. It is the publisher's own research and not an independent study.
What separates over-investing in a channel from testing it?
A test spends a fixed, small amount to learn something, while over-investing commits money, time or people before the learning has happened.
Over-investment, in this essay, is any commitment to a channel that is larger than the evidence you hold for it.
Commitments come in more forms than budget. A hire, a content calendar, a signed contract, product work to suit one platform and a founder's weekly hours all count.
A test is cheap and can be undone. A commitment is neither, which is why the order matters.
Coursera's budget questions point the same way. They ask how much you will need to spend to generate data about how the ads perform, and which metrics will show which methods work best, before they suggest increasing the budget.
What is the test-before-commit rule?
The test-before-commit rule says no new channel gets more than a capped test until a written brief has been met. It is five steps, in this order.
write the brief → cap the spend and the time → run the test → read it against the brief → raise the commitment one step
- Write the brief. Hypothesis, one success metric and a kill line, on paper, before anything is published or bought.
- Cap the spend and the time. Money, founder hours and an end date, all fixed in advance.
- Run the test. A small campaign on the channel, as Salesforce advises, with every visit and signup tagged.
- Read it against the brief. Compare the result with the success metric and the kill line, not with how the test felt.
- Raise the commitment one step. Only if the brief was met, and only to the next step on a ladder you wrote down.
Here is how the rule was put together. Steps three and four follow Salesforce's advice to run small test campaigns and compare conversion rate, cost per acquisition and engagement, and step five follows Coursera's advice to raise the budget as revenue and data arrive.
Steps one and two, and in particular the kill line and the time box, are Kanso's addition. None of the three guides gives them, and the rule as a whole has not been tested in practice.
What belongs in a channel test brief?
A channel test brief needs seven fields, filled in before anything is published or bought. The last column shows which fields come from the sources and which are Kanso's addition.
| Field | What to write | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Hypothesis | One sentence: this channel will reach this type of customer because of this specific evidence | Coursera suggests asking existing customers how they found you and which platforms they use; Salesforce says to know where your audience is active |
| 2. Success metric | One primary number, chosen before the test | Salesforce names conversion rate, cost per acquisition and engagement as the metrics to analyse |
| 3. Spend cap | Money and hours, including founder time, that you can lose in full | Coursera's budget questions ask what it costs to generate performance data |
| 4. Time box | A calendar date on which the test ends | Kanso's addition. None of the three guides gives a duration |
| 5. Kill line | The result at or below which you stop | Kanso's addition. None of the three guides gives a stop rule |
| 6. Tagging | How each visit and signup will be traced to this test | Kanso's addition, prompted by the measurement problems in the Reddit threads read |
| 7. Decision owner and date | The person who reads the result and the day they do it | Kanso's addition |
The spend cap comes out of a wider budget. Kanso's guide to how much a startup should spend on marketing and where, by stage covers that larger number for founders in India.
If the channel reaches few people, the cap and the time box are not enough. Marketing Experiments for Small Teams covers sample sizes and durations for low-traffic tests, and its decision rule is written before launch, which is the same habit this brief asks for.
Why is it so hard to tell what a channel returned?
It is hard because results sit in separate tools and activity gets mistaken for return. Both problems recur in the Reddit threads read for this page, including the r/DigitalMarketing thread asking which channel is actually converting, where the difficulty is measuring end to end what each channel produced.
Another thread, on new marketing strategies working in 2026, adds the other complaint: the playbook seems to change every few months and much of the advice online is out of date. A third, on which channel to bet on in 2026, includes a warning that tracking built for an earlier year can starve the ad platforms of the signal they need.
These threads show what people ask and where they get stuck. They are not data about how founders perform, and no thread is quoted here.
The practical answer is small. Tag every link with a source, medium and campaign, keep the results for every channel in one sheet, and choose the primary metric before the test begins. Kanso's guide to UTM naming conventions that survive a year covers the tagging, and the marketing metrics a seed-stage founder should review weekly covers the sheet.
Why can a small channel test miss the buyers who matter?
A small test reaches few people, and in B2B only about 5% of them are ready to buy at any moment, so a short test sees very few real purchase decisions. Madison Logic describes LinkedIn's 95-5 Rule in these terms: about 5% of B2B buyers are actively in market for a solution, and the other 95% are not yet.
Here is a worked example. The rate is sourced, and the audience size of 200 is a made-up input to show the arithmetic.
200 accounts reached × 5% in market = 10 accounts that could convert during the test
Ten accounts cannot carry a verdict. One more or one fewer conversion moves the in-market result by 10 percentage points (1 of 10), so a decision rule built on the final conversion rate alone would mostly reflect chance.
Two consequences follow, and both are Kanso's reading. First, write the kill line on a number the test can actually move, such as replies or qualified conversations, alongside the final conversion. Second, record a quiet result as “too small to say” unless the brief gave a reason to expect more.
The sources describe the 95-5 Rule for B2B buyers, and the text read does not say whether it holds for consumer products. If you sell to consumers, check your own buying cycle before borrowing the number.
How do you read a test and decide what to do next?
Compare the result with the brief and take one of four actions: stop, extend once, move up one step, or fix the measurement and rerun. The table fixes the action to the result in advance, which is the point of writing it down.
| Result against the brief | Action | What changes |
|---|---|---|
| At or below the kill line when the time box ends | Stop and log the result | Spend on the channel returns to zero and the entry is recorded |
| Between the kill line and the success metric | Extend once, with the same cap and a new end date | One extension only; a second needs a new brief |
| At or above the success metric, with signups traced by the tags | Move up one step on the commitment ladder | The next step has its own written criteria |
| Cannot tell, because tagging failed or too few people were reached | Fix the measurement and rerun once | Not recorded as a pass or a fail |
Moving up a step needs a ladder, and the ladder is yours to write. A workable one runs from a capped test, to a repeat with a larger cap and the same brief, to a recurring slot in the weekly plan, to a named owner and a standing budget, and last to product or hiring changes. Each rung needs its own written criteria, and the sources supply none.
When a test ends, log it in a few lines: the channel, the brief date, the cap, the result against the kill line, the decision and what would change your answer. This is the postmortem habit applied before the failure, so a stopped test costs you a few lines and not a quarter of drift. This page reports no test results of its own.
Which new channel should you test first?
Test the channel where your existing customers say they already look, because the guides agree that goals and audience come before any channel. Coursera suggests asking loyal customers how they found you, what inspired them to buy and which platforms they favor.
| Criterion | Question to ask | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Goals | Which measurable goal will this channel serve in the next quarter? | Coursera, step 1; Salesforce, tip 1 |
| Audience | Where do the customers you already have spend their time? | Salesforce, tip 2; Coursera, step 4 |
| Budget | What would a capped test cost, including tools and your own hours? | Salesforce, tip 3; Coursera, step 5 |
| Competitors | Which channels are competitors not using, and is that a gap or a warning? | Salesforce, tip 4; Coursera, step 3 |
| Testability | Can a small test produce a number you can read? | Salesforce, tip 5; Kanso's reading of the small-sample problem below |
Founders also ask which two channels a newcomer should build first. No source read for this page answers that, and a ranking would be a guess.
Salesforce does list email, organic social media and SEO as lower-cost ways to get started. Kanso's suggestion is to give one slot to a channel where your customers already are, and the other to a capped test.
Salesforce also argues that a multi-channel strategy works best, because each channel has its own audience. That supports running several channels, not trying every new one, and the brief above is what decides which new ones earn a place.
New marketing channels: frequently asked questions
What are marketing channels?
A marketing channel is a tool, platform or touchpoint a business uses to communicate with a market segment and guide it along a customer journey, according to Coursera's guide. Salesforce describes the same idea as a pathway or medium for reaching an audience, and sorts channels into digital and traditional, or into owned, paid and earned.
What is a new distribution channel?
A new distribution channel is a new route a product takes from producer to buyer, which Coursera separates from a marketing channel, a place to communicate with potential customers. This page is about the second kind: new places to reach customers, not new routes for goods.
What is channel testing in marketing?
Channel testing is running a small, time-limited campaign on one channel to see whether it returns more than it costs before you commit more to it. Salesforce's guide describes it as running small test campaigns and comparing conversion rate, cost per acquisition and engagement. The same words also name a cabling check in networking, which is unrelated.
How do you choose your marketing channels?
Start with your goals and your audience, then weigh budget and competitors, and test before committing. That is the order of Salesforce's five tips, and Coursera adds interviewing existing customers about how they found you and what they trust.
Why does a multi-channel strategy work best, and does that mean testing every new channel?
Salesforce argues that a multi-channel strategy works best because each channel has its own audience and gives customers more touchpoints, but using several channels is not the same as testing every new one. Coursera adds that customer interactions can be siloed between channels. Keep your established channels running and give each new one a capped test.
What marketing channel should you bet on in 2026?
None of the sources read for this page supports naming one channel to bet on, and a ranking would be a guess. Madison Logic's survey reports where B2B marketers plan to spend, such as social media advertising (60%) and video content (53%), which is intent and not return. Treat any channel as a test candidate until your own numbers say otherwise.
If you could only start with two marketing channels, which two?
The sources do not name two, but Salesforce lists email, organic social media and SEO as lower-cost ways to start. Kanso's suggestion is to give one slot to a channel where your customers already are and the second to a capped test of something new.
How do you tell which marketing channel is actually converting?
Tag every link so each visit and signup carries its source, then compare conversion rate and cost per acquisition for each channel in one place. Salesforce names those metrics, and the Reddit threads read for this page show teams struggling to measure results end to end when data sits in different tools.
How much should a startup spend testing a new channel?
Set a cap you can lose in full and write it down before the test starts. No source read for this page gives an amount or a percentage, and Coursera's budget questions ask what it costs to generate performance data instead. Include founder hours in the cap, not only cash.
How long should a channel test run?
No source read for this page gives a duration, so the time box is yours to set and write into the brief before you start. How long you need depends on how many people the channel reaches, and Kanso's guide to marketing experiments for small teams has sample-size and duration tables for low-traffic tests.
Sources
- What are Marketing Channels? Definition and Types, Salesforce
- What Is a Marketing Channel? 8 Types to Prioritise in 2026 (updated 5 May 2026), Coursera
- These Are the New Marketing Channels Set to Disrupt Marketing This Year, Madison Logic
- What marketing channel are you betting on in 2026?, Reddit, r/DigitalMarketing
- What are the actual new marketing strategies working in 2026 besides Social SEO?, Reddit, r/AskMarketing
- What digital marketing channel is actually converting for you right now?, Reddit, r/DigitalMarketing
- What's Your Most Effective Marketing Channel Right Now - and Why?, Reddit, r/DigitalMarketing
Note: Facts are attributed to the Salesforce, Coursera and Madison Logic pages and to four public Reddit threads, all read on 5 November 2026. The page contains no sourced history of Google+ or Clubhouse and reports no test results. The rule is Kanso's design and untested. Kanso has no affiliation with any company named here.
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