How the best do it

Teardowns of what specific companies actually did, and the judgment calls great operators make.

What founders use for how the best do it, ranked by how many answers lean on it.

  1. The whole mental model in one short post: not measuring acquisition cost and lifetime value is the point, not an oversight, and... Z-Connect by Zerodha Article · About 3 min read Why Zerodha doesn't advertise Nithin Kamath
  2. The referral history, including the years incentives existed, the regulatory ban, and the striking observation that referrals... nithinkamath.me Article · About 4 min read How Zerodha grew without Advertising Nithin Kamath
  3. The clearest statement of the tradeoff in his own words: venture capital pushes spend toward sales and marketing and away from... Business Today Article · About 8 min read "If you don't invest in R&D, you won't have long term growth," says Zoho Corp's boss Sridhar Vembu Sridhar Vembu
  4. The present day proof that this is a policy and not a phase, with Mani Vembu confirming R&D spend still exceeds marketing spend... Forbes India Article · About 7 min read How Zoho is rewriting the rules of enterprise tech Naini Thaker
  5. The nine models she actually uses, led by growth loops versus funnels. Read this first, because everything else she says... Elena's Growth Scoop Newsletter · About 12 min read My 9 Favorite Growth Frameworks Elena Verna
  6. An anti-pattern list is more useful than another list of tactics, and this one includes the 18 month model refresh and the... Lenny's Podcast Podcast · About 1 hr 10 growth tactics that never work | Elena Verna (Amplitude, Miro, Dropbox, SurveyMonkey) Elena Verna
  7. A real growth org mapped out pod by pod, plus the correction most people need: Dropbox does not run on the famous referral... Elena's Growth Scoop Newsletter · About 10 min read Growth at Dropbox: An Inside Look Elena Verna
  8. Video · Short clip Product-led growth B2B companies succeed if they master this first step | Elena Verna Elena Verna
  9. Krish names all four pricing mistakes rather than the tidy version, and this is where pricing is your strongest lead filter... The SaaS Podcast Podcast · Podcast episode SaaS Subscription Billing Lessons from Chargebee's Journey Krish Subramanian
  10. The contrarian half: he argues public pricing pages are overrated and worth experimenting against, which is worth hearing... SaaStr Podcast · Podcast episode SaaStr Podcast #203: Krish Subramanian, Founder & CEO @ Chargebee on Why Every Startup Should Bootstrap At Some Stage Krish Subramanian
  11. The market you are pricing into, in numbers from 240 companies, so your pricing debate stops being two people's opinions about... Growth Unhinged Report · About 12 min read The state of B2B monetization in 2025 Kyle Poyar
  12. The 8 percent median and the full distribution across 200 B2B products, which tells you fast whether your filter is too loose... Growth Unhinged Report · About 10 min read A new look at free-to-paid conversion Kyle Poyar
  13. Video · Talk The Sales Acceleration Formula | Mark Roberge | Talks at Google Mark Roberge
  14. This is where the numbers live: the rep churn targets, the 25 percent attrition buffer he plans for, and why he will not let a... SaaStr Article · About 20 min read Sales AMA with Mark Roberge: Your Burning Questions Answered (Video + Transcript) Mark Roberge
  15. Six named failure modes including his Sustainable Moat Test, plus the promotion trap that catches almost every first time sales... SaaStr Article · About 12 min read The Most Common SaaS Sales Potholes and How to Avoid Them with Mark Roberge (Podcast #498 and Video) Mark Roberge
  16. The source text for the hiring, training and demand generation formulas, worth owning if you are the person who has to build a... Wiley Book · Book The Sales Acceleration Formula: Using Data, Technology, and Inbound Selling to go from $0 to $100 Million Mark Roberge
  17. Where the profitability argument and the people buy from people line come from, along with his honest read on why Indian SaaS... The Neon Show Podcast · 93 min B2B SaaS Founders Turned VCs Discuss Indian Software Startups | Manav Garg Manav Garg
  18. The concrete deal sizes behind the theory, and the clearest illustration of domain fluency as a moat: he could speak commodity... The Founder Thesis Podcast Podcast · Long-form interview From Coffee Trader to $250M VC: Manav Garg, Together Fund Manav Garg
  19. Video · Interview India SaaS Story - Manav Garg (CE) & Founder, Eka) | Fundraising | Hiring | Going from 0 - 1 Manav Garg
  20. The densest short read on the model: the 76 percent category king number, the Magic Triangle, and the full seven step category... The Marketing Journal Article · About 12 min read "Play Bigger: The How and Why of Category Design" - An Interview with Christopher Lochhead Christopher Lochhead
  21. Two ideas you can use immediately: category names come before company names, and reading acquisition news as the purchase of a... Lochhead on Marketing Podcast · Short episode 025 Category Creation & Category Design: A New Lens On Business Christopher Lochhead
  22. Video · Short explainer Christopher Lochhead on What It Means to Be a Category King Christopher Lochhead
  23. Podcast · Long-form interview Christopher Lochhead, Friend to the Different, Category Design, Author & Pirate, Arrr Christopher Lochhead
  24. The canonical essay, and the one that actually spells out different discovery and monetisation playbooks per segment rather... sajithpai.com Essay · About 28 min read The Indus Valley Playbook Sajith Pai

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The questions

GTM teardowns 16

How named companies actually got their first customers, and what they changed to scale.

How did Freshworks sell to the US from Chennai without a US sales team? 5 → How did Zoho build a global GTM engine without ever raising money? 4 → What did Postman do differently to get developers to adopt before it ever sold anything? 5 → How did BrowserStack get its first millions in revenue almost entirely on word of mouth? 6 → How did Zerodha become India's largest broker with no ads and no sales team? 5 → All 16 questions in GTM teardowns →
How great operators think 16

The mental models, the judgment calls, and the non-obvious moves behind good go-to-market.

What did Slack's "We don't sell saddles here" memo actually change about how they sold? 5 → What does April Dunford say most teams get wrong about positioning? 3 → What does Gong's call data actually say top sellers do differently in discovery? 3 → When should you add a sales team on top of a self serve product, and how do you avoid breaking it? 4 → When does a founder stop selling personally, and why do the best ones hire two reps instead of one? 4 → All 16 questions in How great operators think →
eChai Partner Brands The partnership →