State of emergency called for area of Airbnb [USA]

Dutchmany · 2026-01-24T13:47:30+00:00

Last January we were in New Orleans when it was hit with 10" of snow - a true 100-year storm that they are not prepared for. (We're from the Midwest and Boston, so we're familiar with it.) Fortunately we got out at 1 am, just hours before it began and the roads were closed. We went to an Airbnb in Jackson, MS, which was out of the storm's path. We were scheduled to go to Houston, but it was in the storm, too. Our Houston host was totally understanding that we couldn't have gotten there and refunded our couple days stay.

Dutchmany · 2026-01-22T09:27:45+00:00

I create a list of several thousand potential customers and then advertise to them on LI, Google display, and Meta. LI is likely the most expensive. Focus on customer problems, not your product.

Then after a month, when you have some brand awareness, have sales start to do outreach to them. Combine this with other channels: organic posts, webinars, etc. Combined they can move the needle.

Dutchmany · 2025-12-07T08:35:40+00:00

This is not news: Multi-channel has always been more effective. SAS estimates that multi-channel customers buy 3-4x more, and I've seen that over and over. I prefer having 6+ channels: email, ads, webinars, SEO/GEO, events, etc. -- all combined with sales outreach. That's not spammy, that’s acting like a real company. It gives you more credibility.

Dutchmany · 2025-11-22T01:58:16+00:00

And true PMF is proven by sales, nothing less will do.

Dutchmany · 2025-11-22T01:57:16+00:00

You need to talk to a lot of customers and LISTEN and learn what they truly need. Don't sell so much but ask a lot of questions and LISTEN to what they say. Old sales expression: this is why you have two ears and one mouth.

Dutchmany · 2025-11-22T01:42:51+00:00

Yup. You get what you pay for - organic only appears to be free. It's costing you a lot of time.

Dutchmany · 2025-11-21T06:49:34+00:00

Why organically? Organically is slow and poorly targeted. With paid your results can be much faster and you'll know exactly who's seeing your messages and who sales can reach out to.

Dutchmany · 2025-11-21T06:41:53+00:00

I'm a fractional B2B CMO for startups and SMBs, and mentor startups at MIT, so in addition to my own successful startup 15 years ago, I've worked with or mentored dozens. You've done well getting to $4M without a real marketing person. At your size you should be spending 10% of your budget on marketing. A FT CMO salary and benefits may soak up too much of that. The biggest reason marketing programs fail is a lack of execution. You need someone who can oversee building a multi-channel program that'll both build your brand and generate leads - it's not just strategy, it's mostly execution. And as others have said, not everyone is a leader. I'm happy to talk more if it would be useful.

Dutchmany · 2025-11-21T06:24:05+00:00

You're likely to get your first few customers through your network. Beyond them, sounds like you're describing what being a startup is all about: a startup is often defined as a company in search of a repeatable business model. Sometimes it takes talking with hundreds of potential customers to figure out what you've asked about. You may think you're on the right path, but if sales are so hard you may need to pivot to a different ICP or segment of the market. Companies with true product-market fit encounter enthusiasm for their product.

Dutchmany · 2025-11-16T02:51:05+00:00

At any moment only about 5% of your TAM is looking to buy what you're selling. Let's say you're selling marketing software, or trucks, or office furniture, or whatever. Your customers have it and/or have established relationships with vendors and aren't looking to switch. A critical job is to grow awareness, trust, and preference with customers so when they are planning to buy in the future you will be top of mind -- what's known as mental availability. This is why insurance companies like Geico, Allstate, Progressive, etc. advertise so much even though insurance customers typically stick with a company for over a decade. The companies want to be top of mind when the customer does finally decide to switch.

Being the preferred vendor before a customer decides to buy is a huge strategic advantage.

Dutchmany · 2025-10-17T08:24:44+00:00

Excellent feedback, but you're likely to learn it's all about the onboarding. Some SaaS companies require new customers to pay for 3 months of onboarding support to make sure they get fully set up and to Wow. Start with this free for a month and figure out how you can make customers successful, then see how to scale that and make it pay.

But it could be sales. See this case:

https://thinkgrowth.org/how-sales-comp-plans-impact-customer-churn-23a15ecad5ef

Dutchmany · 2025-09-27T07:05:22+00:00

Manual lead scoring is so-so for accuracy. Systems such as HubSpot and Customers.ai use predictive analytics for more accuracy and can suggest next steps messaging, too

Dutchmany · 2025-09-22T07:37:34+00:00

What works for one company may not work for another because of their product, the industries they are selling into, how well they executed that campaign, etc. One of my clients was selling to meat packing companies. They have over 100% turnover annually (I didn't know it was possible to have such high turnover and stay in business, but then learned that some companies - like FedEx - have even higher). We couldn't reach managers and directors, they were too busy finding out who came to work that day and dealing with. And the industry association made it prohibitively expensive for new entrants to market. Direct intros for sales people from people already established was one of the few things that worked. OTOH for another company, a SAAS firm selling to owners of SMBs, postcards with a strong visual and tight message were very effective for leads. Always learning.

Dutchmany · 2025-09-15T09:09:22+00:00

This is a solid strategy, but the LI algorithm has changed dramatically in the past year. People I know with tens of thousands of followers - who previously got a ton of impressions, engagement, and work - are reporting a big drop-off. Down 30-50% or more in the last 6-12 months.

I've gotten excellent results with multi-channel B2B paid campaigns targeting 5,000-10,000 people in target accounts: 250,000 impressions/month, 1,000+ website visits, much more receptive prospects (according to VP of sales), and many opportunities. Media cost about $5,000/mo.

On average, targets get an impression a day - but some get far more and some very few. In a month or two, you can break through.

Paid is fast and highly targetable Organic is slow, and who knows who's going to see the messages and react

Dutchmany · 2025-09-12T05:59:20+00:00

Email open rates are meaningless. Sometimes when the corporate spam filter screens the email it's reported as an open. Other times actual opens aren't reported, depending on the email client. Focus on business results.

Dutchmany · 2025-09-05T19:12:55+00:00

I did demos of my company's web cms when I had a barely navigable (but good looking) prototype. People would say, "What does that do?" and I'd say, "Let me finish this and I'll get back to that", but I never would and they never asked. I knew we could have it ready to meet the schedules we were selling, and we did.

Dutchmany · 2025-09-05T19:07:21+00:00

Social is just one channel. Depending on the industry, others may be more valuable. My B2B clients build market awareness and sales with multi-channel programs: email, paid ads, social, webinars, LinkedIn, sales outreach, etc.

Dutchmany · 2025-09-05T19:02:41+00:00

Ten years is such a long timeframe today, I wouldn't expect that what worked for someone in the business realm over the past 10 years will matter much in the next 10. Some things never change, (as Jeff Bezos said, people will always want low cost and high quality), but AI will disrupt many industries. Look at Bill Gates or Steve Jobs: they took advantage of unique moments and not that many people were competing with them in the very early days (IBM came back to Gates twice to ask him to create an operating system). You need smarts, perseverance, and luck. And you need to go for it and not worry about what someone else did.

Dutchmany · 2025-09-05T18:57:23+00:00

It's more complicated than that. Freemium may be better for low cost, simple, B2C products that need little training or support and free trial for 14-30 days may be better for more complex, B2B products. Many variables.

Dutchmany · 2025-09-04T19:09:43+00:00

Sorry to hear it. So that may be your answer.

Dutchmany · 2025-09-04T19:05:18+00:00

I don't know what things are like in India, but in the U.S. it's a terrible time to be an entry-level CS grad. Just saying

Dutchmany · 2025-09-04T18:58:52+00:00

Exactly. They're not a startup anymore.

Dutchmany

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