Stacey Massey, Vice President of Sales for TVEyes
When I kicked off 2025 with the team, I opened with a quote that resonated with me, perhaps more than any I’ve come across (and as a competitive gymnast I was exposed to quotes weekly for 15 years).
“Aging is the aggressive pursuit of comfort. The more aggressively we seek comfort, the faster we age.”
-Jaymie Moran
This quote shaped my mindset from the day I heard it, and hopefully my team’s, as well. To say we started the year with big goals would be an understatement. We had to grow as individuals, as a team, and as a company through the launch of Insight, TVEyes’ media monitoring platform. We had no choice but to stretch ourselves and get really uncomfortable. According to Jaymie Moran, that should mean we didn’t age, but I’m positive I gained a few more grey hairs and wrinkles.
During the rapid growth of our company and our team in 2025, I’m heading into 2026 with newfound lessons, revived goals, and how to get very uncomfortable.
Sales is not for the faint hearted
Getting comfortable stalls growth. Sales rewards the people who are willing to stay uncomfortable. The ones who continually evolve and adapt to changes. The ones who keep pushing especially when it gets tough. The ones who stay hungry even when they’re well fed.
This year, demanded that from TVEyes. The industry got louder. The market got more crowded. AI provided the answer to seemingly every question. Buyers got smarter and more cautious. This required us to be more flexible, sharper, and more human. We augment with AI, we don’t copy/paste it.
We’re all feeling the shift. LLMs can crank out PhD-level copy with one prompt. AI writes emails that look custom even when they’re not. But here’s the thing:people, real people, can tell. Because most buyers aren’t PhDs. They’re human. And they know when something doesn’t feel real.
I’ve said this to the team all year: Clever emails don’t close. Conversations do.
That’s why I push hard on selling value over features. Anyone can walk through a UI. That’s not selling. Selling is showing a buyer what actually changes when they bring us in. It’s knowing how to speak to risk, to pressure, to blind spots they didn’t even realize were costing them.
Features are easy. Value takes work.
But value is what creates momentum.
Features just make people feel comfortable.
And we didn’t show up to get comfortable. We showed up to win. Our team realized that in order to differentiate ourselves in a saturated market, it wasn’t just about what the platform can do. It’s about the value that TVEyes brings to a business. It’s about how it elevates a brand, creates strategic shifts, and defines ROI. Simply stating the features didn’t move the needed.
Big swings were, and are, the point
This year was not smooth. The wins did not come easy. The market did not hand us anything. We had to fight for attention. We had to reeducate buyers who thought their stack was complete.
We had to position human, conversational intelligence in a world now chasing AI shortcuts.
I asked the team to take big swings anyway. To believe that what we have is valuable. To trust that our coverage advantage and decades of industry knowledge matters. To walk into competitive situations knowing the bar is high and still go for the win.
I know I pushed them hard. I did it because I know they are capable of more than they think. Growth requires a little pressure and a lot of support. Confidence requires repetition. And progress requires discomfort.
The team kept, and keeps, showing up
This is the part I am most proud of. Even when the results were slow, the team showed up. They kept prospecting. They kept refining their talk tracks. They kept testing new approaches. They kept fixing what was not working. They brought honesty to the process and hard core resilience to the challenges.
That matters. That is what growth looks like in real life. Not a flawless pipeline. Not a lucky streak. Growth is consistency. Showing up when you do not feel like it. Choosing progress over comfort. Choosing effort over ego.
We also learned who we are as a sales team
We learned that we win when we:
- Lead with value
- Sell with conviction
- Stay human in an AI obsessed world
- Know our differentiators
- Push for clarity
- Do not retreat into comfort
- Focus on outcomes over features
And we learned that Insight is only as strong as the people selling it. The platform is powerful, but the reason it lands is because a person is willing to own the narrative and translate the value to a buyer who needs it.
Heading into 2026
This is not the moment to relax. This is the moment to recommit. The work we did in 2025 set the stage for what is next. The momentum does not stop here.
We will continue to compete in a fierce market. We will continue to lead with value. We will continue to chase growth that requires us to think, adapt, and stay sharp.
Comfort is easy. Growth is not. And we did not choose this career because we wanted it easy.
We chose it because we know what we are capable of when we push ourselves.
We’re finishing strong and starting the next year exactly the way we started this one. Hungry. Focused. Uncomfortable. Growing.
Interested in speaking with Stacey and learning more about TVEyes? Visit tveyes.com or email smassey@tveyes.com
