⁣As growth consultants in the B2B software space, we’ve learned a thing or two about what it takes to scale a high-growth company, so we are sharing what we’ve learned about driving fast, efficient growth through a series of short, easily digestible reads.
Mosaic Minute 12/13/2021
Unlike a general company-level vision which is usually just aspirational, something that resonates with both internal and external stakeholders, a company’s growth vision is highly actionable and achievable. Intended for internal use, the growth vision articulates what success looks like 3-5 years from now, how it will be achieved, and the specific, measurable KPIs that will be used to measure it.
Not convinced your organization needs a growth vision? Try this exercise at your next executive meeting and you might be surprised. Give the team 3 minutes to write down what success for your organization looks like in 3 years and what needs to happen between now and then to realize this success. It is likely that the responses you receive will be quite diverse, presenting several viable paths to success.
This should not be surprising; in fact, it is actually quite exciting to be in a place where there are multiple ways to achieve growth, whether it is via market expansion, product development, acquisitions, increased marketing, etc. The problem occurs when leaders, eager to demonstrate progress and early indicators of success, try to pursue all these paths at once, fueling internal chaos and conflict. To get ahead of going down this unproductive path, carve out the time to establish a growth vision.
Step 1: To kick off the process, conduct an honest internal assessment, gathering input from other executives and key stakeholders. This exercise should be intense and difficult; it should reveal what is working and what is not. It should underscore unique internal assets and strengths while surfacing organizational weaknesses and competitive vulnerabilities. As old school as it is, we’ve found the most effective way to manage this process is through a good old SWOT analysis.
Step 2: Use insights gained from the assessment to define a vision that allows the organization to reach its growth goals and meet investor expectations in the most efficient way. What needs to happen next and/or hold true over the next 3 years to make the vision a reality?
Step 3: Gain the buy-in of your executive team. Surface any tensions or doubt in the vision and WORK THROUGH THEM. Then, empower your executives to effectively galvanize their own teams around the growth vision.
TL;DR
Not all growth is created equal. The best kind of growth for recently funded, growth-oriented companies is efficient growth – maximum impact in the shortest time requiring the least amount of investment. The path to efficient growth may deviate from long-held organizational beliefs and executive biases on how future success will be reached. That’s okay. Working through this will enable you to build an even more powerful growth vision – it will serve as a North Star for the organization, a way to objectively make decisions around resource allocation and prioritization, and a ‘limiter’ to ensure the company remains on the same success path.
#growth #b2bsaas #saasmarketing

⁣As growth consultants in the B2B software space, we’ve learned a thing or two about what it takes to scale a high-growth company. To start, we realize how difficult and all-consuming it can be. Content on best practices and how-to’s is always a nice-to-have, but if you are responsible for growth at a B2B software company you don’t have time to find and read long white papers.
That’s why we are going to start sharing what we’ve learned about driving fast, efficient growth through a series of short, easily digestible reads. Although our company name calls out marketing specifically, our content will cover everything that has an effect on successful growth.
Ready or Not, Here Comes Growth
For most of the PE-backed software companies we work with, something went incredibly right – strong product, ripe market, good timing, unmet need. To grow successfully post-investment will require a fundamentally different approach (in other words, what got the company from A to B is not the same path that will get them from B to C). Almost all the executives and leadership teams we work with recognize this and, as a result, are highly focused on building a go-forward growth strategy, in addition to the long list of other post-transaction to-do’s like developing a budget, preparing for the first board briefing, hiring for key positions, etc. but often forget to ask a key question – is the organization ready for transformational growth? And we’re not referring to things like strategy, processes, talent, technology, etc here. This needs to be about the organization’s culture and mindset.
TL;DR
The post-close excitement and motivation is really only tangible for the few people who were involved in the months of diligence and negotiations leading up to a transaction or deal. For everyone else in the company, it’s all brand new and largely unfamiliar. One of the most important jobs of a leader is to convey this excitement and optimism about the company’s future to the rest of the organization by sharing a growth vision which includes:
Clear articulation of what future success looks like
Well-defined growth goals and targets
Identification of key growth levers
Our next Mosaic Minute will elaborate on how to develop a compelling growth vision and gain buy-in at all levels of the organization.

⁣We are going to start with the punchline upfront – most of your go-to-market teams are likely not focusing on the right buyer. To explain what I mean, let’s break your target market into 3 different groups.
Total Addressable Market (TAM): This is the largest of the 3 groups and also the number that gets most of the executives and investors excited. Basically, this captures the universe of potential customers. However, it is likely that your current product offering cannot effectively serve your entire addressable market. Here’s where the next group comes in.
Ideal Customer Profile (ICP): This is the part of your TAM for which your current product has strong product-market fit. As a result, your ICP represents the real, immediate potential your company has to drive growth. For B2B software, ICP is defined by firmographic criteria that is shared across your typical buyer. This criteria could be based on industry, geography, revenue, and other qualification criteria.
Active Buyer: An active buyer is someone within your ICP that has initiated the buying process. This means they are at least aware that your product or product category exists and show clear signs of starting down the purchase consideration and/or purchase intent path. It’s important to keep in mind that, at any given moment, it is likely that less than 3% of your ICP can be called an active buyer. In other words, trying to time engagement with a buyer as they become active is like trying to find a needle in a haystack – time-consuming, frustrating, and likely not productive.
It is essential that the go-to-market team is aligned around who falls into your ICP and what signals may indicate that an ICP lead may be moving into the active buying process. Don’t assume sales and marketing are on the same page here. In fact, 9 out of 10 times, in organizations that are just starting to ramp up an inbound motion, we see a sales team that is expecting all marketing-driven leads to be active buyers while the marketing team is working to capture qualified leads of any sort. This results in a disappointed sales team and a frustrated marketing team.
TL;DR
To avoid cross-functional tension and an unproductive situation, establish ongoing two-way communication across the go-to-market team. If you don’t already have a go-to-market team meeting on the calendar, add one. The purpose of these meetings is for the marketing team to provide an update on strategies and tactics and the sales team to offer feedback and insight into lead flow and quality. Keep in mind, as you start to increase top-of-the-funnel volume, it may be necessary to consistently revisit the organization’s definition of an MQL.

As you put together your marketing plan, it is critical to set your marketing goals upfront because:
1. It will help you understand if that tactic was successful
2. You understand its contribution to the overall goals
3. You can get to predictable growth
4. You can learn more from your efforts

If you are looking for proven ways to grow your business through content and SEO, this interview is a must watch! In this interview, Anna Crowe of Head of Content and SEO at LeadFeeder walks us through her keys to SaaS growth. It takes a lot to impress us, but we were pretty blown away by her answers where she focuses on a wide range of topics including:
-Know your ICP
-Understand your prospects behaviors
-How Slack's insights to retention changed the way they market
-The need for trust to drive growth
-How video is a key to Google voice search
-Who SaaS companies need to hire
-and finally a couple of burrito references!

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