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 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...
The AI GTM strategy gap most B2B founders haven't seen yet
Reader, a founder sent me his cold outreach numbers last month with a note that said "Finally making progress." His reply rate was 1.2%. He had spent three months building the infrastructure. The sequences were running. The enrichment pipeline was connected. The system looked right. The problem was not the system. The problem was what the system was built to do. Most AI GTM systems are built to produce more output. More emails, more posts, more touchpoints. And in a market where B2B tech...
Your CAC isn't a budget problem (2026 benchmarks inside)
I was scrolling LinkedIn last week when something stopped me cold. Not a single post. The scrolling itself. Post after post of polished, AI-assisted content about data strategy, digital transformation, and growth frameworks. All saying something. None saying anything distinct. I read the first sentences of six posts in a row and couldn't have told you who wrote them. And then it clicked - this is a huge reason why CAC is climbing. Customer acquisition costs in B2B tech have jumped 40-60%...
How Marcos Rivera built a 25-person pricing firm on word of mouth
Get this, Reader... 6 months before Marcos Rivera left Vista Equity Partners, he started sending messages to people he used to work with. Not pitches. Not teasers about his upcoming practice. Just, "hey, what's going on? Changed jobs? How are things?" The thing is, cold network outreach asks people to do you a favor before you've re-established any relationship capital. It works occasionally, but it feels bad to everyone involved. Marcos inverted the dynamic entirely. He spent that pre-launch...
The AI readiness gap your ERP vendor isn't talking about
Reader, The other day Andy Park told me about a friend who runs a mid-market manufacturing company. The guy has Epicor running from a server closet at his plant. Products ship on time. His team knows the system. Everything works. Then the vendor starts pushing him to migrate to the cloud version. Three times his current annual spend. No direct migration path. A full reimplementation. His question is completely reasonable: Why would I spend half a million dollars and risk my entire operation...
Your pricing model is your org chart
Hi Reader, Fact is, most founders optimize the wrong variable when they're trying to scale. They focus on shipping faster, hiring more engineers, closing more deals. But the pattern I see in fast exits? It's not about velocity. It's about pricing structure + hiring discipline. I've helped consultancies go from zero to $750K enterprise contracts in 4 months. The companies that scale fastest don't charge by the hour. They charge by the outcome. Case in point: Algoage (built and sold in under 2...
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.