CONVERGENCE
Real growth strategy from a startup CMO: The frameworks, interviews, & honest insights that 100k+ founders and operators actually use. The weekly newsletter by Lillian Pierson that cuts through the noise and gets straight to what works.
The 3-layer context system I build before touching any AI tool
Reader I've worked with enough AI-native startups to recognize the pattern fast. The founder has good instincts, a technically solid product, and a team that's excited about AI in their marketing. They're producing content, posting on LinkedIn, and running tools across the stack. And their audience is quietly tuning out. When they come to me, they usually have a sneaking suspicion that something's off with the content itself, but they can't name it. So I run the diagnosis. And almost every...
His migration story closed deals faster than any pitch deck (5 companies, 2 exits)
Get this Reader Twenty-two years ago, Balendran Thavarajah arrived in Sydney from Northern Sri Lanka with no English, no formal education, and nothing to lose. A few years later, he was walking into small supermarkets with a laptop and a barcode scanner, asking owners for five minutes of their time. That same day, they were shaking his hand and telling him to come install the system. In four months, he had 20 customers. No CRM, no email funnel, no content strategy. Just a founder who saw a...
B2B SaaS is spending $2 to make $1. Here's why.
You know Reader... The median B2B SaaS company right now is spending $2 to acquire $1 of new revenue. That means more than two years just to break even on the cost of closing a customer… and that’s before accounting for churn risk, delivery costs, and everything else that goes into running a business. When founders see that number, most reach for one of three responses: Hire a better marketer, Increase the budget, or Cut marketing (and go back to founder-led sales). Most of the time, none of...
Something I keep seeing at $1M to $3M ARR
Reader - There's a pattern I keep running into with technical founders at the $1M to $3M ARR stage. The pipeline is thin. The founder is in every deal. They know it's not sustainable, so they hire a sales rep. And then, about three months later, the rep can't close without the founder in the room, and nothing has actually changed. What's frustrating about this, and I mean genuinely frustrating, is that the founders I'm talking about are actually great at sales. Pacific Crest data puts founder...
2.3x slower growth. Here's why, and how to stop it.
Hi Reader - At startups under $2M ARR, about 68% of revenue comes from the founder's personal network. That list is finite. Most founders hit the end faster than they expect. And when they do, the instinct is to hire a sales rep. Three months later, nothing has changed. The rep can't close, the founder jumps back in, and the business is exactly where it started, except now it's paying an extra $80K a year. It may surprise you that founders are usually pretty great at sales. Founder win rates...
The free offer that got Planoverse into Australia’s biggest retailers
Howjer Gu started Planoverse with a clear understanding of what his software could do, and a willingness to show up and prove it for free. He hadn’t yet built a case study, a recognizable brand, or a marketing budget. What he’d built was a structured way to create value before any contract conversation began. The model he built was a half-hour monthly workshop with enterprise retail decision-makers. Five minutes of live product demo. Twenty-five minutes of open co-design conversation. No...
Something I keep seeing… I finally put on camera
Hey Reader, I’ve been sitting on this one for a while. It’s not that I was ashamed of the results (10,000 leads at $5 each with zero paid ad spend is pretty hard to argue with)... I just wanted to make sure I presented the solution in the best possible structure. The thing I keep running into with technical founders… they’ve usually built something that’s genuinely remarkable. They’re marketing team is putting in lots of work. But… the pipeline’s still not moving. When I walk into those...
I got $5 leads in a $595 market. Here’s the full breakdown.
Hey Reader, I just published a full case study breakdown on YouTube, and I want to get it in front of you before it gets buried. The short version is that SingleStore had one of the best technical webinar programs I’d ever seen. Genuinely strong content, real expertise, and a serious product. But pipeline from their webinar series simply wasn’t moving. The industry benchmark for paid lead acquisition in their category was $595 per lead… and for a typical product-led growth motion, that...
Something I keep seeing with technical founders
I talk to a lot of technical founders- Reader And almost every one of them, at some point in the conversation, hits the same wall. They know they need marketing leadership. But they have no real framework for figuring out what kind fits where they are right now, or when the timing actually makes sense. So they default to whatever feels least risky. An agency. A part-time hire. Staying founder-led a little longer. And then a few months later they realize the cost of that call, either in runway...
Hire too early & burn runway. Wait too long & 💥
Reader, Most technical founders know they need marketing leadership at some point. What they don't have is a framework for deciding what kind, or when. So they guess. They hire an agency because it feels lower risk. Or they bring in a full-time CMO too early because it signals they are serious. Or they stay founder-led for too long because nothing else has felt right. Each of those decisions has a real cost. And most founders only find out what it was after the fact. I built the exact...
Real growth strategy from a startup CMO: The frameworks, interviews, & honest insights that 100k+ founders and operators actually use. The weekly newsletter by Lillian Pierson that cuts through the noise and gets straight to what works.