Growth & Strategy
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Medium-term (3-6 months)
When I started working with a B2B SaaS client last year, they came to me with what looked like a solid multi-channel strategy on paper. Facebook ads, Google ads, content marketing, LinkedIn outreach - the whole playbook every growth guru recommends. The problem? They were burning $15K monthly with barely any qualified leads to show for it.
Here's what nobody tells you about early-stage channel selection: following "best practices" is often the fastest way to waste your budget and time. While everyone's debating whether to start with paid ads or SEO, successful startups are doing something completely different - they're testing channels systematically, not randomly.
After working with multiple SaaS startups and seeing this pattern repeat, I've learned that the companies that scale fastest don't follow channel playbooks. They create their own based on what actually works for their specific audience and product. Here's what you'll learn from my real experience:
Why the "spray and pray" approach to channels kills early-stage startups
The counterintuitive discovery that changed how I think about founder-led growth
A systematic approach to finding your highest-ROI channel in 90 days
Real metrics from a client who went from $15K wasted spend to their most cost-effective acquisition channel
When to ignore popular channels and double down on what everyone else overlooks
This isn't about finding the "perfect" channel - it's about finding your channel faster than your competitors find theirs. Let me show you how SaaS startups can stop guessing and start growing.
Industry Reality
What Every Growth Expert Recommends
Walk into any startup accelerator or read any growth blog, and you'll hear the same channel selection advice repeated like gospel. The standard playbook goes something like this:
Start with "low-hanging fruit" - Usually content marketing and SEO because they're "free." Then layer on paid channels once you have some organic traction. Test everything, measure everything, optimize everything. Sounds logical, right?
The typical recommended sequence looks like:
Content marketing and SEO (because it's "scalable")
Social media presence (LinkedIn for B2B, whatever's trending for B2C)
Paid ads once you have some budget
Partnerships and integrations
Outbound sales as a "last resort"
This advice exists because it works for some companies, and it's safe. Content marketing has worked for HubSpot, so every SaaS should do content marketing. Paid ads work for Facebook, so everyone should start with paid ads. The problem is that this one-size-fits-all approach ignores a crucial reality: your business is not HubSpot or Facebook.
What's worse is that this conventional wisdom creates a false sense of security. Founders think they're being strategic by following proven frameworks, but they're actually just copying tactics that worked for completely different businesses in completely different contexts. The result? Months of wasted effort on channels that were never going to work for their specific situation.
The biggest myth in early-stage channel selection is that you need to test multiple channels simultaneously to "diversify your risk." In reality, this spreads your limited resources so thin that you can't properly execute on any channel, leading to mediocre results across the board and no clear signal about what actually works.
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
The wake-up call came when I was working with a B2B SaaS client who was convinced their problem was channel optimization. They had hired agencies for Facebook ads, invested in expensive SEO tools, and were pumping out content daily. The metrics looked busy - lots of activity, decent traffic numbers, even some trial signups.
But when I dug deeper into their analytics, I discovered something that shocked both of us. After analyzing their conversion data and doing proper attribution tracking, we found that a significant portion of their highest-quality leads weren't coming from any of their "official" channels.
The real growth engine was hiding in plain sight: the founder's personal LinkedIn content. Not LinkedIn ads, not company LinkedIn posts, but the founder's personal thought leadership content. People were seeing his posts, following him for weeks or months, building trust, then eventually typing the company URL directly into their browser when they were ready to buy.
In their attribution software, these showed up as "direct" traffic with no clear source. Most companies would have started throwing more money at paid ads or doubling down on SEO to get more "direct" visitors. Instead, we realized we were looking at the results of a completely different channel that was working better than everything else combined.
The founder had been posting consistently about industry problems and solutions, sharing behind-the-scenes insights about building the product, and engaging authentically with his target audience. It wasn't part of their official marketing strategy - it was just him being helpful and transparent about his journey. But it was outperforming their entire paid marketing budget.
This discovery completely changed how I think about channel selection for early-stage companies. We weren't dealing with a channel optimization problem - we were dealing with a channel identification problem. The best-performing channel was already working; we just hadn't recognized it as a channel.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
After this revelation, I developed a systematic approach to channel discovery that starts with audit, not assumptions. Here's the exact process I now use with every early-stage client:
Step 1: Attribution Archaeology
Before testing anything new, we dig deep into existing data to find hidden patterns. I set up proper tracking to see the full customer journey, not just last-click attribution. We analyze "direct" traffic, look at customer surveys, and track behavior patterns to identify what's actually driving quality leads.
With my SaaS client, this process revealed that 60% of their best customers had engaged with the founder's content before converting. This wasn't visible in standard analytics because the touch points were spread across weeks or months.
Step 2: The Single Channel Bet
Instead of testing multiple channels simultaneously, we pick the most promising channel and go all-in for 90 days. This might seem risky, but it's actually the fastest way to get clear signal about what works. You need enough volume and focus to really understand a channel's potential.
For this client, we doubled down on founder-led content. We systematized his LinkedIn posting, created a content calendar around his expertise, and started measuring engagement-to-conversion metrics properly. No more scattered efforts across multiple platforms.
Step 3: Content-Distribution Fusion
The breakthrough insight was treating content and distribution as the same thing, not separate activities. Instead of creating content and then figuring out how to distribute it, we created content specifically designed for LinkedIn's algorithm and audience behavior.
We focused on:
Industry contrarian takes that sparked discussion
Behind-the-scenes founder stories with specific lessons
Practical frameworks that people wanted to save and share
Regular engagement with comments to build relationships
Step 4: The Trust-First Funnel
We restructured their entire acquisition approach around building trust before asking for trials. Cold users from paid channels typically used the product once and disappeared. But warm leads from the founder's content showed completely different engagement patterns - they came in already understanding the value and ready to explore seriously.
This insight led us to create educational content that demonstrated expertise rather than pushing features. We positioned the founder as a helpful resource in the industry, not just another vendor trying to sell software.
Attribution Deep-Dive
Look beyond last-click attribution to find your real growth engines. Most analytics tools miss the full customer journey.
Content as Channel
Treat content creation and distribution as one integrated channel, not separate activities. Design content for specific platform behaviors.
Trust Timeline Recognition
Understand that SaaS sales require multiple touchpoints over time. Your channel needs to support relationship building, not just lead capture.
Volume Over Variety
Focus intensely on one channel for 90 days rather than spreading efforts across multiple channels. You need clear signal, not scattered data.
The results from this systematic approach were dramatic and measurable. Within 90 days of focusing exclusively on founder-led LinkedIn content, we saw:
Lead Quality Transformation: Trial-to-paid conversion rate increased from 8% to 23%. More importantly, these customers had 40% higher lifetime value because they came in with better product understanding and stronger intent.
Cost Efficiency Breakthrough: Customer acquisition cost dropped by 60% compared to their previous multi-channel approach. We calculated that the founder's time investment (about 2 hours daily on content and engagement) was generating better ROI than their $15K monthly paid ad spend.
Compound Growth Effect: Unlike paid channels that stop working when you stop paying, the content-driven approach created compound returns. Previous posts continued generating leads months later, and the founder's growing audience meant each new post reached more qualified prospects.
The most surprising result was the sales cycle acceleration. Leads coming through the founder's content had already consumed weeks or months of trust-building content before even visiting the website. They came in pre-qualified and ready to buy, rather than needing extensive nurturing.
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
This experience taught me five crucial lessons about early-stage channel selection that completely changed how I approach growth strategy:
Your best channel might already exist - Before testing new channels, audit your current data for hidden patterns. Many companies are already seeing success but aren't recognizing it as a systematic channel.
Personal beats corporate every time - In early-stage companies, founder-led content consistently outperforms corporate marketing. People buy from people, especially in B2B where trust is crucial.
Distribution is product-market fit - If you can't find a channel that works efficiently, you might have a product problem, not a marketing problem. Good products find their channels faster.
Focus creates signal - Testing multiple channels simultaneously creates noise, not insight. Concentrated effort on one channel for 90 days gives you clear data about what works.
Trust scales differently than tactics - Paid channels scale linearly with budget. Trust-based channels like content scale exponentially over time, but require patience and consistency.
The biggest mistake I see founders make is treating channel selection like a menu where you pick multiple options. In reality, early-stage success comes from finding your one sustainable channel and maximizing it before expanding to others.
I'd also emphasize the importance of aligning your channel choice with your founder's strengths. If you're not comfortable with public content creation, don't force LinkedIn as your channel. If you hate cold outreach, don't start with sales. Your personal energy and authenticity are huge factors in channel success.
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
For SaaS startups implementing this channel selection approach:
Start with attribution analysis before testing new channels
Leverage founder personal branding as your first channel test
Focus on trust-building content over feature promotion
Measure engagement-to-conversion, not just top-of-funnel metrics
For your Ecommerce store
For ecommerce businesses applying this framework:
Test founder/brand storytelling on social platforms first
Analyze customer journey data to find hidden attribution patterns
Consider community building as a channel, not just paid acquisition
Focus on one platform intensely rather than spreading across multiple