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Building Your Revenue Engine As Your Startup Evolves
The document discusses the evolution of revenue generation in startups, outlining three phases: the 'Wizard of Oz' phase, the 'Scooby Doo' phase, and the 'Oceans 11' phase, each representing different levels of operational clarity. It emphasizes the importance of aligning sales and marketing, understanding customer personas, and leveraging effective processes for customer success to reduce churn and drive sustainable growth. Key strategies include focusing on a specific persona, refining lead management, and optimizing unit economics for scaling the business.
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Building Your Revenue Engine As Your Startup Evolves
- 1. HOW TOBUILD YourREVENUEENGINE as yourstartup evolves HANA ABAZA VP MARKETING,UBERFLIP @hanaabaza
- 2. Self Serve >High-Touch Full funnel visibility > Complex buying process 19 Employees> 73 Employees Channel problems > Process problems Big Customer Churn > Negative Revenue Churn Thelast27months
- 3. youneedmorethanA great productto scale Aneffective system for improvingprocess and operations can be a competitive advantage.
- 4. PEOPLE PROCESS TOOLS (Inthat order!)
- 5. 3 Phases ofEvolution
- 6. The Wizard ofOz Phase You’re following the yellow brick road, things are happening, but…
- 7. Don’t look behindthe curtain cause it’s a f@!&ing s*#%show.
- 8. The Scooby DooPhase You sort of know what you’re doing. You usually solve the mystery. But mostly, you’re still a bunch of bumbling idiots.
- 9. The Oceans 11Phase A team of specialized people with defined roles. You’re focused, coordinated and executing based on a strategic plan.
- 10. Whereareyou? Wizard of OzScooby Doo Oceans 11 Different parts of your business may be at different stages.
- 11.
- 12. Sales&marketingare onthesame spectrum Sales SalesSales Demand Marketing + Sales Brand & Demand + Sales *It doesn’t mean brand doesn’t matter early on – but your area of focus is different.
- 13. CustomerSuccessisthe heartofyourgrowth Support (reactive) Support& Success Support, Success, Advocacy
- 14. Control Churn Boost Revenue CreateAdvocates Feed Marketing Customer success
- 15. You need tounderstand the operational mechanisms at play. howdoyouscaleallthe “otherstuff”
- 16.
- 17. WhoisYOURBREADANDBUTTER Everyone! More focusedOther growth layers
- 18. WhoisYOURBREADANDBUTTER Everyone! More focusedOther growth layers Nope. It’s not. Figure out P/M fit. It isn’t always super clear.
- 19. WhoisYOURBREADANDBUTTER Everyone! More focusedOther growth layers Who is your bread and butter? Can you create a scalable and repeatable process with predictable revenue growth? Nope. It’s not. Figure out P/M fit. It isn’t always super clear.
- 20. WhoisYOURBREADANDBUTTER Everyone! More focused Ifyour bread & butter segment is scalable and repeatable, it might make sense to to explore other opportunities. Other growth layers Who is your bread and butter? Can you create a scalable and repeatable process with predictable revenue growth? Nope. It’s not. Figure out P/M fit. It isn’t always super clear.
- 21. Free Trial Connect Content Customize Hub Upgrade Customer Lead Marketing Qualified Lead Sales Qualified Lead Opportunity Customer Nikki Mary, Jenn & David Self-serve/low touchfunnel Marketing& sales engine
- 22.
- 23. The problem withmost startups isn’t a lack of ideas. It’s the lack of clarity and focus.
- 24. Lead Marketing Qualified Lead Sales Qualified Lead Opportunity Customer What happened when we picked one? ü More focused ü Better process ü Higher Value (ARPC & LTV) ü Negative Churn
- 25. Lead Marketing Qualified Lead Sales Qualified Lead Opportunity Customer 3 things that had to happen: ü Revamp analytics set up ü Shift in growth tactics ü Define process and criteria for handing leads to sales (this needs ongoing refinement and will change as you scale)
- 26. You might makea different decision but remember… “It’s hard to build a big business outof smalldeals.” Resource: mattermark.com
- 27. HowDOyouknowwhichPERSONA? *Product/Market fit Unit Economics Opportunity Whatdo you want? This gets more complex as you go upmarket.
- 28. HowDOyouknowwhichPERSONA? If you’re focusedon mid-market and enterprise companies with a complex buying process, you may have a handful of “personas”that you need to learn about.
- 29. @Uberflip These are theones most likely to be your first point of contact. They will either reach out to you themselves or will be the ones you will most frequently contact. Marketing Mary Demand Jenn Do-it-all David Strategic Samantha
- 30. @Uberflip Champion25-39 Purchase Process Research: Events,peers, Google Events: INBOUND, CM World, other content-specific events Blogs & Influencers: HubSpot blog, MarketingProfs, CMI, LinkedInPulse Social Media: Preferred Content: Want specific, actionable pieces of content. Short format (blog or video). Things that will make them better at their job. Watering Holes Marketing Mary Customers Adriane Holter, Impinj FloraCheung, Loblaw Cassandra Jowett, Influitive VictoriaHoffman Kelly O’Hara Uberflip’s Marketing Marys
- 31. @Uberflip Job Role Years Experience:3-10 Essential Duties: Creates content. May be in charge of strategy, sometimes also in charge of social. Tools: Google Docs, CMS, Marketing Automation Common Titles: Marketing Coordinator, Specialist, Manager, sometimes Director. May have content or similar specialization in title. In some cases, Product Marketing Manager. Goals & Initiatives: Want to write more and be creative. Looking to learn as much as possible, especially around SEO, analytics, and strategy. Want to move up in company. Challenges: Creating engaging B2B content that attracts views. Proving that long- term strategy is valuable and not everything has immediately measurable ROI. Demand to create and edit content for entire marketing team/entire buyer journey. Room for Growth: Wants to learn more about analytics, SEO, creating a long-term strategy.
- 32. @Uberflip Focus on engagement,shareability, awareness, and content creation / experience audiences love. If reaching out by email, tryto stand out. Shecan see through automated emails-- use personality. Ideal Messaging Creative types, usually interested in writingor have a writing background Find it difficult to find time to be creative due to execution of tasks HATE being reached out to — they need to GSD! Title worth calling out:Product Marketing Notable Learnings
- 33. “By not decidingon one of these personas, we paid a gigantic, invisible ‘optionality’ tax.” - Brian Halligan, CEO of HubSpot Fromstartup toscaleup Resource: readthink.com
- 34. It’s notjustthepeople. It’s theprocess. (theirinternal process)
- 35. Initial Touch (Champion) Influencers & DecisionMakers Budget Approval (YAY!) Verbal Yes (YAY!) Procurement (SHIT) EVERYONE needs to understand the buying process.
- 36.
- 37.
- 38.
- 39. YourFunnel Lead Customer Lead Qualified Lead Customer Lead Marketing QualifiedLead Sales Accepted Lead Sales Qualified Lead Opportunity Customer
- 40. YourFunnel Lead > MQL> SAL > SQL > OPP > Customer Opportunity Stages 1. Evaluating 2. Recommended 3. Verbal Yes 4. Procurement 5. Closed (Won/Lost) Opportunity Customer Sales Qualified Leads Sales Accepted Leads Marketing Qualified Leads Leads
- 41. YourFunnel A linear funnelis overly simplistic. It’s dynamic and bi-directional. Opportunity Customer Sales Qualified Leads Sales Accepted Leads Marketing Qualified Leads Leads 1. People may move up and down your funnel 2. Sales & marketing functions overlap at every stage of the funnel
- 42. YourFunnel A linear funnelis overly simplistic. It’s dynamic and bi-directional. Opportunity Customer Sales Qualified Leads Sales Accepted Leads Marketing Qualified Leads Leads 1. Feedback mechanisms to enhance quality 2. Coordinated campaigns at every stage 3. Process for re-engaging lost leads & accounts
- 43. YourFunnelvs. theirjourney Awareness InterestEvaluation Purchase Decision Advocacy Repeat marketing sales marketing sales marketing marketing marketing and sales sales marketing and sales
- 44. YourFunnelvs. theirjourney Awareness InterestEvaluation Purchase Decision Advocacy Repeat blog email social PPC SEO webinars eBooks whitepapers retargeting demo nurture sales customer board customer webinar expansion referral campaign
- 45.
- 46.
- 47. ü Product ü Process üReporting
- 48. Opportunity Customer Lead Management Nurture, Scoring, Data Enrichment, Lead Recycling Sales Enablement Messaging, Positioning, Collateral Sales Qualified Leads Bi-‐directional Funnel Mechanisms in place to facilitate feedback loop between marketing and sales to enhance lead quality and re-‐engage lost opportunities. Sales Accepted Leads Marketing Qualified Leads Leads Campaigns & Programs Grade My Stack, The Uberflip Experience, Content Events & Partner Marketing, Content Syndication, Publishers, PPC, ABM, Outbound Lead Engine Customer Marketing Marketingengine
- 49. Opportunity Customer Lead Management Nurture, Scoring, Data Enrichment, Lead Recycling Sales Enablement Messaging, Positioning, Collateral Sales Qualified Leads Demand Generation Sales Accepted Leads Marketing Qualified Leads Leads Campaigns & Programs Grade My Stack, The Uberflip Experience, Content Events & Partner Marketing, Content Syndication, Publishers, PPC, ABM, Outbound Lead Engine Customer Marketing Marketingengine
- 50. WTFisdemandgen? Demand generation isthe engine that generates leads, identifies and nurtures qualified prospects, and optimizes conversion throughout the sales cycle. (psst… demand gen is marketing)
- 51. Opportunity Customer Nurture campaigns, data enrichment,lead management processes Sales collateral, sales training, messaging & persona, reporting Sales Qualified Leads Core Operations Sales Accepted Leads Marketing Qualified Leads Leads Messaging, design , asset creation content marketing, optimization, campaign management. Lead capture, source tracking, lead scoring. Usage data, account health, advocacy & referral
- 52. Strategies&Tactics • Content (syndication),webinars, partner marketing.Lead Generation • PPC (Social & Search), RetargetingOnline Advertising • Large niche publishers with a substantial reader basePublishers • Highly targeted, niche topic and audienceConferences • Partner marketing (webinars, ebooks, events etc.)Partners • Content, SEO , social etc.Organic Leads
- 53. Whatfuelsdemandgen? Content Marketing (peopleneed to be nurtured) Direct Channels (are people ready to buy) Event marketing (volume vs. deal size) Account based marketing (ABM)
- 54. Structure yourmarketingteam One ortwo generalists More focused roles Highly specialized
- 55. COREMARKETINGFUNCTIONS Content Marketing Audience Growth Lead Generation Awareness Demand Generation Lead Generation Lead Nurture Operations & Insights Events Marketing Lead Gen / Nurture Customer Nurture Awareness Product Marketing Sales Enablement Product Feedback Product Positioning
- 56. Communic- ations Sales Enablement Field Marketing Advocate Marketing Brand Marketing Otherpossiblefunctions Ops & Analytics
- 57. Teamstructure &growth How youbuild and structure your team depends on where you need to focus your marketing and growth efforts.
- 58. Identifying key signalsfor lead quality, outreach indicators and intent to purchase is one of the most important demand gen functions. Quality,indicators &intent
- 59. How doweknow? fit engagementintent ?
- 60. Lead Scoring Predictive Analytics *Butwe also need to understand the pre-purchase indicators where you can prompt action How doweknow intent?
- 61. Site re-design Fiscal yearend Rampup in content strategy Investment in technology Change in role Industry growth Outreachindicators
- 62.
- 63. MQLs Leads SALs SQLs OPPs A respondent to a marketing campaign who doesn’t yet meet our minimum qualification and behaviour criteria A lead who makes the minimum fit criteria and has displayed enough interest to be handed off to sales. MQLS are scored and categorized as cold, warm, or hot leads An MQL that has been accepted by the BDR for further qualification to determine pipeline-readiness An SAL that has been identified as pipeline-ready but needs further qualification to determine the probability of converting to an opportunity An SQL that has progressed to an opportunity and is now committed to pipeline DEFINITION ACTIVITY Lead gets entered into the appropriate segmented nurture program Lead has achieved a score of 35 or higher and is entered into a new MQL nurture program BDR is identifying prospects requirements and probing to understand the context for buyers’ decision AE is actively engaged in meaningful dialogue to validate the use case, identify the champion, and schedule a demo Uberflip has been introduced to a wide audience and there is general team consensus around solution need, value and fit LEAD RECYCLING: the handoff to sales took place but the prospect doesn’t respond, doesn’t have budget or some other roadblock. Sales believes there is potential for the future. The lead gets placed back into the funnel for further nurturing with the goal of re-engagement at a later time. LEAD LIFECYCLE EXAMPLE
- 64. MQLs Leads SALs SQLs OPPs A respondent to a marketing campaign who doesn’t yet meet our minimum qualification and behaviour criteria A lead who makes the minimum fit criteria and has displayed enough interest to be handed off to sales. MQLS are scored and categorized as cold, warm, or hot leads An MQL that has been accepted by the BDR for further qualification to determine pipeline-readiness An SAL that has been identified as pipeline-ready but needs further qualification to determine the probability of converting to an opportunity An SQL that has progressed to an opportunity and is now committed to pipeline DEFINITION ACTIVITY Lead gets entered into the appropriate segmented nurture program Lead has achieved a score of 35 or higher and is entered into a new MQL nurture program BDR is identifying prospects requirements and probing to understand the context for buyers’ decision AE is actively engaged in meaningful dialogue to validate the use case, identify the champion, and schedule a demo Uberflip has been introduced to a wide audience and there is general team consensus around solution need, value and fit LEAD RECYCLING: the handoff to sales took place but the prospect doesn’t respond, doesn’t have budget or some other roadblock. Sales believes there is potential for the future. The lead gets placed back into the funnel for further nurturing with the goal of re-engagement at a later time. LEAD LIFECYCLE
- 65. MQLs Leads SALs SQLs OPPs A respondent to a marketing campaign who doesn’t yet meet our minimum qualification and behaviour criteria A lead who makes the minimum fit criteria and has displayed enough interest to be handed off to sales. MQLS are scored and categorized as cold, warm, or hot leads An MQL that has been accepted by the BDR for further qualification to determine pipeline-readiness An SAL that has been identified as pipeline-ready but needs further qualification to determine the probability of converting to an opportunity An SQL that has progressed to an opportunity and is now committed to pipeline DEFINITION ACTIVITY Lead gets entered into the appropriate segmented nurture program Lead has achieved a score of 35 or higher and is entered into a new MQL nurture program BDR is identifying prospects requirements and probing to understand the context for buyers’ decision AE is actively engaged in meaningful dialogue to validate the use case, identify the champion, and schedule a demo Uberflip has been introduced to a wide audience and there is general team consensus around solution need, value and fit LEAD RECYCLING: the handoff to sales took place but the prospect doesn’t respond, doesn’t have budget or some other roadblock. Sales believes there is potential for the future. The lead gets placed back into the funnel for further nurturing with the goal of re-engagement at a later time. LEAD LIFECYCLE Sales and Marketing Need to Agree On EVERYTHING
- 66. MQLs Leads SALs SQLs OPPs A respondent to a marketing campaign who doesn’t yet meet our minimum qualification and behaviour criteria A lead who makes the minimum fit criteria and has displayed enough interest to be handed off to sales. MQLS are scored and categorized as cold, warm, or hot leads An MQL that has been accepted by the BDR for further qualification to determine pipeline-readiness An SAL that has been identified as pipeline-ready but needs further qualification to determine the probability of converting to an opportunity An SQL that has progressed to an opportunity and is now committed to pipeline DEFINITION ACTIVITY Lead gets entered into the appropriate segmented nurture program Lead has achieved a score of 35 or higher and is entered into a new MQL nurture program BDR is identifying prospects requirements and probing to understand the context for buyers’ decision AE is actively engaged in meaningful dialogue to validate the use case, identify the champion, and schedule a demo Uberflip has been introduced to a wide audience and there is general team consensus around solution need, value and fit LEAD RECYCLING: the handoff to sales took place but the prospect doesn’t respond, doesn’t have budget or some other roadblock. Sales believes there is potential for the future. The lead gets placed back into the funnel for further nurturing with the goal of re-engagement at a later time. LEAD LIFECYCLE Set Expectations -- SLA
- 67. Smarketingchallenges Selling Implementing ProcessScaling Process
- 68.
- 69. Uniteconomics Do we havePM Fit? Does the math work? Does the math scale?
- 70.
- 71. CAC Uniteconomics LTV Cost of Sales& Marketing / #of new customers Avg. MRR x Customer Lifetime Customer Lifetime 1 / Churn Rate (months or years) Resource: forentrepreneurs.com
- 72. CAC problems LTV Are you calculating“fully loaded” CAC? Do you really know LTV? Customer Lifetime Is churn even accurate? Resource: forentrepreneurs.com
- 73. CAC RATIO Uniteconomics PAYBACK LTV toCAC Ratio Guideline = 3+ Efficiency/Scalability Months to recover CAC Guideline = <12 months Cashflow/Profitability Source: forentrepreneurs.com
- 74.
- 75.
- 76.
- 77. Company A CompanyB CAC $1000 $1000 MRR $100 $100 ACV (MRR*12) $1200 $1200 Payback 10 months 10 months Churn 2.5% 2.5% LTV (MRR / Churn) $4000 $4000 CAC Ratio 4 4 Adapted from: sixteenventures.com
- 78. Company A Focus ondecreasing CAC Pay less per customer Find cheaper channels Increasing Tofu cconversion Focus on TOFU metrics Company B Focuses on CAC efficiency Better marketing/sales process Evaluate pricing Shorten payback period Increase customer value DecreasingCACvs.CACEfficiency Adapted from: sixteenventures.com
- 79. *Increasing ACV andmoving to annual payments will allow for increasing spend to drive faster / more growth and outspend competitors. Company A Company B CAC $800 (-20%) $1000 MRR $100 $167 ACV (MRR*12) $1200 $2000 Payback 8 months 6 months Churn 2.5% 2.5% LTV (MRR / Churn) $4000 (no change) $6680 (+67%) CAC Ratio 5 (+25%) 6.68 (+67%) Adapted from: sixteenventures.com
- 80. Yes, these aretotally made up. But they do illustrate the potential of focusing on efficiency. While in some cases, focusing only on decreasing costs might be warranted, it may also decrease lead quality, lowering your customer conversion rate (and subsequently effecting CAC negatively).
- 82.
- 83. PEOPLE PROCESS TOOLS (Inthat order!)
- 84. What’syourstack? Email marketing CRM Analytics Optimization Marketing Automation CampaignManagement Data enrichment Sales automation Predictive Analytics Multi-touch attribution Programmatic Personalization
- 85. Automating bad marketingis still bad marketing.
- 86. Automating bad marketingis still bad marketing. Don’t jump to the tech too soon. You need the foundational elements in place first – good people, good process and good marketing.
- 87.