Growing a SaaS? Yeah, that's hard. Growing a SaaS without a clue what you're doing from a marketing and growth perspective? Pretty much impossible. Especially if you want to break the $100K MRR mark. Your host Asia Orangio (previously Asia Matos) breaks down the marketing myths and lays the foundation for SaaS and startup founders to grow their businesses with strategies and tactics that actually work — no matter if you're bootstrapped or VC funded. Listen, learn, subscribe, and execute. About your host: Asia Orangio is the CEO & Founder of DemandMaven. Asia helps founders of early-stage startups reach their MRR goals through proven growth strategies across GTM, acquisition, activation, retention, and expansion. In early 2018, Asia founded DemandMaven — a consulting firm dedicated to helping bootstrapped and funded early-stage startups build revenue-generating marketing engines. Previously, Asia served in a number of marketing roles, but most notably as head of marketing at Hull where she helped the team 10.5x in growth, and #FlipMyFunnel / Terminus as demand generation manager.
EP32: What if We're Bad at Product Management?
Product management isn’t easy. And the reality is some founders just aren’t that good at it.
In this episode, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, discusses the importance of effective product management in growth and why striving for 'quality of life improvements' - small tweaks to existing features - over 'value generators' - hurts growth.
If you haven't seen it, check out The Work, a weekly newsletter: https://demandmaven.substack.com/
Timeline:
1:33 - Product management is ultimately the process of determining and prioritizing what features to build, what value to provide and deciding how to actually get that done. It is not order taking.
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29/11/2023 • 33 minutes 21 seconds
Ep 31: Globalization and the Importance of Understanding Customer Behavior with Angeley Mullins
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, chats with Angeley Mullins live from SaaStock.
Angeley is a seasoned commercial and operations executive ( E-Commerce & B2B SaaS) with leadership roles across the US, EMEA, & APAC including: Amazon, Intuit, and GoDaddy. She is currently Chief Commercial Officer at Resourcify. Angeley focuses on both growing scale- ups including Seed / Series A - Series C , as well as larger corporations and NGOs.
They discuss Angeley's experience in the tech industry, the importance of having a global perspective, and the need for diversity in leadership.
Angeley shares insights on how to tackle globalization, the importance of understanding customer behavior in different markets, and shares her personal expe
21/11/2023 • 29 minutes 45 seconds
EP30: Qualitative vs. Quantitative
Description: As we approach the end of the year, we rely on the information we have to make decisions and plans for future growth. In order to have a full picture, it is critical to have been capturing high-quality qualitative as well as quantitative information.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down why both types of information are important and examples of how to incorporate qualitative information to understand the ‘why’ behind your numbers.
TL;DL
Timestamps:
4:50 - Quantitative insights are things like conversion rates, retention rates, daily active users, and most founders tend to be
14/11/2023 • 21 minutes 42 seconds
EP29: Focusing vs. Niching
When it comes to building a business there is a big difference between focusing and niching.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down how you can achieve focus by niching, but why you don't have niche to achieve focus.
TL;DL:
2:00 - When we talk about focusing, it is a founder really dedicating for a period of time to a specific part of the market. Niching is going to market saying that you only serve a specific segment. An example of a niched product is a CRM that is for trucking companies. An example of focus could be a CRM for small businesses that is investing over 12 months in focusing on marketing agencies and then the next 12 months focused on design firms.
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07/11/2023 • 30 minutes 9 seconds
Ep28: The Top 5 Growth Drivers
What are the best areas to focus on when you’re trying to drive growth in your company?
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down the top five growth drivers for SaaS businesses.
Growing Awareness
Growing Traffic
Capturing More Leads
Increasing Sales
Increasing Business Capacity
TL;DL
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31/10/2023 • 21 minutes 46 seconds
EP27: Growth During an Economic Downturn
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down the strategies successful companies have used to survive and grow through downturns and how to apply it to your business.
TL;DL:
1:00 - A lot of companies simply over-hired during the past couple years of growth and the layoffs now are correcting for that as opposed to a greater market downturn.
5:30 - In a true economic downturn, layoffs and cuts might not be your best strategy for future survival.
6:45 - There are lots of different levers that can lead to growth. Increasing leads and traffic, increasing in sales, increasing retained customers, increasi
25/10/2023 • 24 minutes 4 seconds
EP26: The SaaS Black Hole
Are you building a SaaS product but have not yet got your first paying customers? You might be in or about to go into the SaaS Black Hole.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down the SaaS black hole and covers how to think about pivoting, building your team, and bringing in outside help when you’re in this phase of building your company.
TL;DR:
3:40 - The SaaS black hole is the time when you are going from having trial users to charging for your product and working on getting your first 10 paying customers.
8:30 - The black hole phase looks different for every company. Sometimes, in rare cases, you nail the product and peop
18/04/2023 • 30 minutes 24 seconds
EP25: Top 5 Areas for Growth
Are you investing in marketing, but not seeing the growth you were aiming for? It might be because you’re overlooking another key growth area.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down the top five areas to look at first when it comes to growth.
You’ll learn why marketing might not be the best lever to pull in your business right now and how focusing on operations, retention, and activation can drive your growth.
TL;DR
0:45 - Putting more dollars into marketing won't be the best growth investment if you haven't taken care of the core areas of the business yet.
1:50 - Area #1 is th
11/04/2023 • 22 minutes 28 seconds
EP24: Painkiller vs. Vitamin
Are you building a painkiller or a vitamin?
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down the two categories of products and how you can use the concept in marketing your SAAS business.
You’ll learn why most successful SAAS businesses are pain killers, examples of both types of business, and how your messaging and positioning should adapt to the product your building.
TL;DR
0:48 - Breking down the concept of painkiller vs. vitamin as it applies to your product.
1:51 - What is a painkiller solution? It is a product that is solving a very specific problem directly. For example, Lo
04/04/2023 • 20 minutes 14 seconds
EP23: The 8 Customer Yeses
Every long-term customer your business has went through a series of decision and said yes at each step along the way.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down the 8 customer yeses and how you can create an environment that makes it easier to get a yes each step of the way.
TL;DR
2:30 - There is a series of 8 yeses that a prospect needs to go through to become and stay a customer.
3:10 - #1 Yes, I have a problem. A the start comes an initial recognition of the problem.
3:40 - #2 Yes, I want to solve that problem. Realizing you have a problem do
28/03/2023 • 24 minutes 9 seconds
EP22: Unaware Audiences
Your business growth feels like it’s plateauing and so you’re thinking about focusing on a less aware audience is that a bad idea?
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down 5 levels of audience awareness and where it makes sense to place your marketing attention and budget.
TL;DR
3:00 - Going after unaware audiences is the last thing you should plan to do when you're growing your company, but there are lots of marketing agencies that will recommend you do just that.
6:20 - Going through an example of why a founder might get to a place where they want to go after unaware audiences.
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21/03/2023 • 26 minutes 32 seconds
EP21: First marketing hire
Now that you know the basics of how to get started with building out a marketing team it’s time to diving into how and when to hire your first marketing leader.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down types of marketers that makes since as a first hire, where to sources them from, and how to set them up for success in the first 90 days.
TL;DR
1:36 - Who is the best type of marketing to hire?
If you are in the software space, you should really only be looking at a generalist who is well versed on demand generation or content marketing.
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14/03/2023 • 26 minutes 45 seconds
EP20: Hiring a marketing team
One of the questions most founders have is, "How do I start building a marketing team?"
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down the options that exist for founders starting to build out their marketing teams and what is the best fit for companies depending on the budget and time constraints they are facing.
TL;DR:
1:20 - The four options for building your marketing team are:
Generalist or specialist contractors
Agencies or consultancies
Full-time or part-time em
07/03/2023 • 30 minutes 46 seconds
EP19: High performing CEO
What are the four traits that separate the highest performing CEOs from their peers? In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down the decision-making and approaches great CEOs use to consistently generate results.
Here’s the link to the article discussed in todays episode: https://hbr.org/2017/05/what-sets-successful-ceos-apart
TL;DR:
2:24 - What set's successful CEOs apart from their counterparts?
Deciding with speed and conviction
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28/02/2023 • 42 minutes 1 second
EP18: Founder to CEO
As a founder it can be hard to pull back and step into the role of CEO, but usually that is the most important move you need to make for the long term success of your company.
In this episode of InDemand, Asia Orangio, CEO of DemandMaven, breaks down how to think about making the transition from being a great founder to being a great CEO!
Timestamps for TLDR:
0:35 - Welcome back to the In Demand podcast!
1:25 - The focus for this upcoming season of the show is on being and becoming a better CEO.
3:22 - What does it mean to be a CEO? Making great decisions, being a therapist, being the coach for the team, creating vision, framing the firms business challenge,
8:30 - It
21/02/2023 • 28 minutes 18 seconds
EP17: The 3 stages of marketing
Is your marketing great, good, or non-existent? No matter where it is today, it’s important to recognize where you are and what your next steps should be.
In this episode of InDemand, Asia Orangio, founder of DemandMaven, breaks down the three stages of marketing, how to know which stage you're in, and what to do to level up from one stage to the next!
The three stages of marketing are:
From No Marketing to Some Marketing
From Some (or bad) Marketing to Good Marketing
From Good Marketing to Great Marketing
10/03/2021 • 28 minutes 56 seconds
EP16: The 3 stages of growth
Is your growth strategy working? There are few questions as important. In this episode of InDemand, Asia Orangio, founder of DemandMaven, walks through the three stages of growth, and the key actions for assessing and planning for improvement from each stage.
Understanding where we are at when it comes to growth will help you know where to focus and what next steps make the most sense on your growth journey.
03/03/2021 • 22 minutes 56 seconds
EP15: How to prioritize your growth ideas
As a founder, you probably think of new growth ideas everyday. But how many of the ideas do you follow through on? Deciding how to prioritize your growth ideas is the critical first step to implementing them.
In this episode of InDemand, Asia Orangio, founder of DemandMaven, walks through the different frameworks you can use to evaluate your growth ideas and decide which you will prioritize.
24/02/2021 • 28 minutes 14 seconds
EP14: Can you measure product-market fit?
How do you know if you have product-market fit? You measure it! In this episode of InDemand, Asia Orangio, founder of DemandMaven, breaks down the different ways to think about measuring product-market fit and how to apply it in your SaaS business.
17/02/2021 • 24 minutes 46 seconds
EP13: How product-market fit ACTUALLY works
Does your business have product-market fit? Are you sure? There can be a lot of grey area when it comes to understanding your business's product-market fit, but with a bit of examination, we can bring clarity to the topic and plot a course for strengthening your products fit with the market.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, founder of DemandMaven, breaks down product-market fit and how to think about measuring and improving your own product-market fit as you bring to market and grow your product.
10/02/2021 • 21 minutes 5 seconds
EP12: How Long Does it Take to See Marketing Results
When it comes to measuring marketing nuance is key. For every market, product, and business, the results of marketing have their own specific context. To understand when you should be expecting results from your marketing efforts, you need to understand the context of that work.
03/02/2021 • 56 minutes 32 seconds
EP11: Why Every Founder Needs a Market Vision
We all start our businesses for different reasons. For some, it is a personal pain point--a problem that we want to solve for ourselves. For others, it is a person or group that we want to help. No matter how you start as a founder, it is crucial that you find the big why for your business--the reason your business exists.
26/10/2020 • 27 minutes 42 seconds
EP10: How to Compete in an Overcrowded Market
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio, founder of DemandMaven, shares the principles for growing a SaaS company when you are competing in an overcrowded market.
At DemandMaven, we just wrapped up a project for a client that was in one of the most competitive markets. While we had some incredible wins, we also had many lessons learned. We distilled those lessons into 6 principles for founders to apply when they are entering a highly competitive market.
Dive deeper by reading the full article that inspired the episode: https://demandmaven.io/lessons-learned-from-competing-in-an-overcrowded-market/
TLDL:
You’re
15/07/2020 • 28 minutes 40 seconds
EP9: How to Know You Have Product-Market Fit
Product market fit is often talked about like it is a specific destination. A place you arrive at once and know that you’ve arrived. But the reality of growing a SaaS company is that you may not know if you have product-market fit or if you have it, you may not know how good the fit really is.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio of DemandMaven shares the seven best indicators for when you’ve found product-market fit and how to take action if you haven’t reached them yet.
TLDL:
It feels like you are guiding a boulder down a mountain, not pushing it up the mountain.
When customers are signing up despite some product issues and every new lead or customer doesn’t feel like a lot
25/06/2020 • 30 minutes 51 seconds
EP8: The Biggest Growth Lessons I’ve Learned (the Hard Way)
Some lessons in marketing are easy to learn. You pick them up from a book, take a class, or hear a talk and get it immediately. Other lessons are harder to come by. They are the ones learned over time and through experience. The ones that we look back on and think about the head start we could have got from applying them earlier.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio of DemandMaven shares the four biggest lessons that she learned the hard way. From customer journey’s to funnels and go to market strategy, you’ll learn growth lessons you can implement today to avoid learning them the hard way yourself in the future.
18/06/2020 • 27 minutes 53 seconds
EP7: How to choose the BEST acquisition channels
Understanding your acquisition channels is key to growing your business, but convoluted terminology, different strategies, and numerous channels it can be hard to know where to focus your efforts.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio of DemandMaven breaks down the basics of acquisition channels, from overviewing different types of channels to general and specific strategy for maximizing your use of acquisition channels to grow your business!
11/06/2020 • 30 minutes 51 seconds
EP6: Top 8 Customer Research Mistakes
Customer research can be an absolute game changer. It gives you insight into not only what your current customers think of your product, but also who they are, what they want, and how you can better serve them and others in the future. But not every type of customer research is right.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio of DemandMaven breaks down 8 ways that you might be doing your customer research wrong and how you can update your research to upgrade your results.
TLDR;
[1:20] - #1 You’re not doing customer research at all
If you’re not doing research, you can be sure what you’re customers think about your product and business. You’re not only missing out on improving your product no
28/05/2020 • 34 minutes 31 seconds
EP5: Let's talk about FUNNELS
Funnels are a great thinking tool for founders. They help us clarify the journey our customers take and help us plan the steps needed to scale. But thinking in funnels can narrow our vision if we don’t truly understand the reality behind the tool.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio of DemandMaven breaks down the basics of funnels. From the different types of funnels to common misconceptions and how marketers and founders can use them to maximize them to grow their business.
TLDR;
[1min] What actually is a funnel?
It’s a simple way to visualize how a prospect becomes a customer. From the top were prospects/leads learn about a product, down to where they consider it
21/05/2020 • 38 minutes 7 seconds
EP4: The WORST Assumptions You Can Make as a SaaS Founder
In our personal lives we’ve learned that assumptions will often lead us astray. When it comes to an early stage SAAS startup, they can be the difference between success and failure.
In this episode of In Demand, Asia Orangio of DemandMaven shares the six worst assumptions that you can make as a SAAS founder and how to reframe them for success.
Extra Resources:
Check out the Baremetrics blog post on SAAS milestones: https://baremetrics.com/blog/how-fast-saas-companies-hit-arr-milestones
TLDR; The Worst Assumptions You Can Makes as a SAAS Founder
1
14/05/2020 • 51 minutes 50 seconds
EP3: What to Do When Your Growth is Stagnant
Growth suddenly going stagnant? Here's the top 3 strategic questions you need to answer in order to unpack and troubleshoot your stagnant growth.
07/05/2020 • 25 minutes 9 seconds
EP2: The PERFECT Time for Marketing
When it comes to early-stage SaaS founders trying to grow their businesses, there's a perfect time for marketing and there's less ideal times for marketing. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to time your marketing efforts for maximum impact and efficient investment. Asia Orangio of DemandMaven digs deep into what scenarios make sense for founders to invest in marketing, and what scenarios would warrant more customer discovery instead.
