Hi, I’m Phil.

I started Paperplane because I kept seeing the same pattern. An ambitious company builds a product that solves a real problem. Traction comes. Then the pressure to "do marketing" kicks in, and the team ends up busy without compounding anything. The product is there. The team is capable. But the GTM system never catches up to what the product actually deserves. That distance is the commercial yield gap, and closing it is what every engagement comes back to.

Most agencies treat positioning as a tagline exercise.

I've run 40+ engagements across HR tech, fintech, legal tech, marketing agencies, and professional services, and the pattern is often the same: positioning wasn’t treated as a conviction.

It's the one trade-off that makes the hundred next decisions compound. I think it's one of the most important business decisions and takes the same discipline you'd bring to an M&A deal or a tech stack choice. Most of my work starts by undoing work that was scoped wrong.

I've also been the in-house marketer. I've launched offerings into markets that didn't exist yet, moved companies from SMB to enterprise, and repositioned products mid-growth.

I don't take on work I can't be close to. Every engagement is me, in the room, with your team. I don't hand off a strategy I haven't pressure-tested against the people who have to run it.