How Embed went from invisible to in-demand in a niche B2B payments market

When trust determines everything but marketing barely exists

Embed provides embedded payments infrastructure for vertical SaaS companies: a high-trust, high-stakes B2B market where credibility matters as much as technology.

Yet despite the product’s maturity and growing customer base, co-founder Alex Schoonkind faced a familiar problem:

“We were doing almost no marketing. Two blog posts, never promoted. No Google Ads, no LinkedIn Ads, nothing. Our company page looked dead.”

Like many start-up founders, Alex had relied almost entirely on word-of-mouth. And although referrals work well in payments, the lack of brand presence created challenges when larger enterprises evaluated Embed.

“No inbound, no brand visibility, and users never see our name because we’re fully white-label,” Alex explains. “We looked smaller than we actually were.”

But hiring in-house hadn’t worked either. The role quickly became too broad and the company needed more than one person could realistically cover. Marketing in a technical industry like payments requires deep expertise across multiple disciplines (content, SEO, ads, messaging, strategy) and a generalist hire couldn't keep up.

Embed needed a different model, but the idea of an outsourced marketing team wasn’t even on the table yet.

Finding a partner that ‘gets it’

Alex began exploring external help, but quickly noticed a pattern: most agencies were too junior, too campaign-focused, or too eager to push generic lead-generation tactics that simply don’t work in a niche B2B payments environment.

“Most agencies felt very salesy,” Alex explains. “They talked a lot about lead gen, but people don’t wake up thinking: ‘I need embedded payments.’ Unmuted understood that.”

Unmuted stood out immediately for the depth and seniority of the team, the strategic approach and the cultural fit. The difference was noticeable, even in the evaluation process.

“We ended up speaking to the actual team we’d be working with. That made a big difference. They felt like people we could have hired internally,” Alex notes.

From zero inbound to a steady flow of opportunities

Before working with Unmuted, Embed had virtually no inbound pipeline. That changed quickly.

Shortly after Embed’s marketing engine began running consistently with Unmuted, inbound contact requests doubled compared to pre-marketing months. And more importantly, the quality shifted dramatically. Previously, nearly all inbound requests were irrelevant. Now, almost a third come from ICP-fit companies.

This interest is also turning into pipeline. Within just a few months, marketing-generated opportunities began stacking up, with a healthy number of ICP-fit deals now moving through the funnel.

Google Ads has proven particularly effective at capturing demand, while LinkedIn plays a more strategic role in building mental availability that later converts through search and direct channels. Together, they form a balanced engine where visibility, trust and discoverability reinforce each other.

“We suddenly had people saying they’d seen us pop up a few times and it made sales conversations much warmer. Before Unmuted, none of that was happening.” - Alex Schoonkind, Co-founder at Embed

Plus, Embed’s improved visibility reached investors. VCs and private equity firms began reaching out (something that had never happened prior to the collaboration) and direct competitors started emulating Embed’s content within weeks of it going live.

“It was clear that the work was landing,” Alex notes. “We were suddenly part of the conversation.”

Making a 20-person team look like a 100-person company

When considering the overall impact, Alex highlights one thing above all: Unmuted made Embed look like a much larger, more established company, without pretending to be something it wasn’t.

“Every start-up wants to feel like they have a full marketing department behind them. That’s exactly what we got.” - Alex Schoonkind, Co-founder at Embed

He also notes how quickly the team understood the technical world of embedded payments - an area where many marketers struggle to get up to speed.

“The team understood our business pretty fast. Payments is complex, and not everyone can pick it up. That made a big difference,” Alex explains.

With a validated story, growing visibility and a steady flow of ICP-fit inbound requests, Embed now has a clear and scalable go-to-market foundation. Their early results signal that the company’s narrative is resonating with the right audience, and that its presence in the market is strengthening month by month.

What began as an effort to “look alive” in the market has evolved into a structured engine that builds trust, drives demand and positions Embed as a credible, recognized player in the payments infrastructure ecosystem. And with the foundations now in place, Embed is primed for the next stage of its growth journey.