(2026-01-13) Poyar The GTM Channels Im Betting On In 2026

Kyle Poyar: The GTM channels I’m betting on in 2026. Ramp’s automated outbound team, one of the earliest AI SDR programs, used to be a closely-kept secret. It got started in 2021 and at its height accounted for 30% of Ramp’s pipeline, which is a phenomenal success considering how quickly Ramp soared to more than a billion in revenue. And Ramp just shut it down. Returns plateaued as competitors caught up.

Rippling found their programmatic outbound was burning through their TAM. They needed a higher touch and higher conversion channel in order to maintain hyper-growth, via CRO Matt Plank. They’ve since hired more than 150 outbound SDRs to cold call into target accounts, and have seen conversion increase from <1% to between 3-7%.

These are two examples of a broader pipeline crisis being felt across the industry. The GTM channels that worked before don’t necessarily work today. And even the channels that seem to work all of a sudden stop working as product categories mature and competitors catch up.

Today I’ll break down which GTM channels I’m betting on in 2026, and how they differ for early-stage startups compared to mature scaleups. (A spoiler: intimate in-person events.)

What’s working for early-stage B2B startups (<$10M ARR)

These respondents said they have 4.7 core GTM channels and another 6.2 GTM channel experiments. (This sounds exhausting, but is actually fewer than later-stage scaleups.)

The most popular core channels for early-stage B2B startups include LinkedIn (67%), founder brand (53%), warm outbound (49%), SEO (45%), and intent-based outbound (37%).

I mapped how popular different GTM channels are (horizontal axis) versus how likely they are to be seen as impactful among adopters (vertical axis).

Perhaps unsurprisingly, startups are struggling with SEO.

Paid advertising similarly fell in the over-saturated quadrant.

The other popular GTM channels earned a spot in the tried-and-true quadrant with the combination of founder brand, LinkedIn, and warm outbound proving to be particularly effective.

The channel that consistently performed best might surprise you. It’s intimate in-person events (think: regional dinners, happy hours, meetups, hackathons). While intimate events are only a core GTM channel for 36% of early-stage startups, nearly everyone who invested here said they were happy with the results.

What’s working for B2B scaleups (>$10M ARR)

The most popular core channels for B2B scaleups include large conferences and tradeshows (80%), LinkedIn (78%), SEO (74%), paid ads (66%), and intimate in-person events (59%).

Outbound, particularly automated outbound via email, fell in the over-saturated quadrant as scaleups expanded beyond $10 million ARR (as Ramp and Rippling experienced). The most likely buyers were probably already targeted multiple times over

While still popular, LinkedIn stops becoming a growth channel. Founders now have less time to spend crafting highly personal posts. The algorithm starts to feel like it’s working against you.

Large conferences and intimate events are two of the five tried-and-true channels as we start 2026

Two less talked about channels broke into the top right quadrant for scaleups: big product launches and ecosystem marketing.

Where to invest more in 2026

Respondents selected the top three channels where they plan to increase GTM investments the most. There were two runaway winners: AI discovery (AEO) and intent-based outbound.

AI discovery has had a breakout 2025. In my conversations with GTM leaders I’ve consistently heard this is the fastest-growing source of high-intent leads

Intent-based outbound is having a moment, too, although this might be surprising given that it’s already an over-saturated channel for scaleups.

the race is on to find first party or highly bespoke intent signals that aren’t available to others

A thought exercise to start the year: if you couldn’t invest in a single new channel in 2026, what would you do differently to hit your growth targets? I bet you could get much more out of what’s already working, which is systematically under-appreciated relative to working on something new.