Wynter's Peep Laja on the art of B2B SaaS messaging

00:00:01:23 - 00:00:34:19

Ben Hillman

Imagine you're preparing to open a brand new restaurant in a bustling city. The cuisine, exquisite ambiance, perfect. The service impeccable. But as the doors open and potential customers walk by, they don't seem drawn to your establishment. The problem? Your menu is confusing. The descriptions are bland, and the name of the restaurant doesn't resonate with passers by. This is the power of messaging without clear and enticing messaging.

00:00:35:02 - 00:01:05:03

Ben Hillman

Even the most outstanding offerings can struggle to attract an audience. And B2B says, much like restaurants, your software might be top notch, offering exceptional value to your customers. However, if your messaging doesn't resonate with your target audience, they may never give your product a chance. That's where the art of crafting compelling messaging comes into play. In a saturated marketplace, it's essential to have a story that sets you apart, captures attention and connects with your customers.

00:01:07:01 - 00:01:30:13

Ben Hillman

Enter Pay Player, the founder of Wynter, a platform dedicated to perfecting messaging through customer insights. With years of experience in the world of B2B SaaS, Peep has become a go to advisor for startups and established companies alike. He understands the importance of storytelling, positioning and messaging in a competitive market and knows how to guide businesses to achieve maximum impact.

00:01:30:22 - 00:01:54:14

Ben Hillman

In today's episode, we'll dive deep into Peep's journey from his early beginnings as an entrepreneur to building Wynter, his insights on creating powerful messaging for your B2B SaaS, and why telling a better story is crucial for startups looking to make their mark. Sit back, relax, and let us take the notes for you as we uncover the secrets behind effective messaging and learn from the master himself.

00:01:55:14 - 00:02:22:16

Ben Hillman

From Paddle, it's Protect the hustle, where we explore the truth behind the strategy and tactics of B2B SaaS growth to make you an outstanding operator. On today's episode, Peeppler talks to paddle CMO Andrew DAVIES about messaging. They talk about what good messaging really means, the B2B messaging framework, doing routine maintenance on your messaging, expanding audience while balancing supply and demand, and PayPal's unexpected beginnings as a serial entrepreneur.

00:02:22:21 - 00:02:48:06

Ben Hillman

After you finish the episode, check out the show notes for an in-depth field guide focused on understanding messaging. Then, while you're leaving your five star review of the podcast, tell us what resonated most about the advice Peepper had to share. First up, Peep talks about what good messaging really means.

00:02:50:06 - 00:02:57:13

Andrew Davies

So with me this morning, we have Peep from Wynter. He's the CEO. Peep, Why don't you just say hi? Introduce yourself. Tell us where you located right now.

00:02:57:16 - 00:03:02:06

Peep Laja

Hey, I'm Peep from Wynter. I'm the founder CEO, and I'm in Austin, Texas.

00:03:02:09 - 00:03:07:16

Andrew Davies

Wonderful. Wonderful. And given the time zone differences, it must be super early there. So I assume you've had a few coffees already?

00:03:07:16 - 00:03:09:01

Peep Laja

At least one. Yes.

00:03:09:02 - 00:03:17:12

Andrew Davies

For those who don't know, can you give us a quick intro to Wynter, what the business is and does, and really how you kind of came to found this business?

00:03:17:12 - 00:03:38:12

Peep Laja

Wynter I call it the buyer intelligence platform. So really what it means is that I'm connecting B2B SaaS companies with people who buy software. And so B2B companies can get feedback on their messaging positioning from their exact ICP. So people that are actually trying to sell to our survey, they must know what they think about this or that.

00:03:38:12 - 00:04:00:15

Peep Laja

And I came upon this idea while solving my own problem at my previous company, C Excel, where I had 100 different products. Each product has its own separate like a product landing page, and I was wondering if my ideal customer is reading there the sales pitch? Are they like, Wow, this is amazing? Or is it like, who cares or what?

00:04:00:15 - 00:04:17:07

Peep Laja

What's interesting? What's boring? And I was looking for a tool that would tell me because I knew a long time ago that the best way to increase the conversion rate is to increase improve the words on a page. But I wasn't able to find a tool. All I could find was other people with the same exact problem.

00:04:17:10 - 00:04:23:00

Andrew Davies

Very cool. So how long ago did the business went to actually, you know, get founded? And where are you on your journey?

00:04:23:01 - 00:04:33:01

Peep Laja

We are finishing our second year in business. You know, there was like a one year of just building it behind the scenes. Then we launched. So it's two years now as Wynter Wyntering.

00:04:33:03 - 00:04:52:02

Andrew Davies

Full disclosure here. PUDDLE We're a customer of yours. We love your product. We're we're big users of it. And I think what you're doing here is launching into a space which is, you know, very clearly underserved because marketers like myself have often had to take, you know, a couple of other different approaches, either go and, you know, work through very expensive panels that are perhaps built up to serve.

00:04:52:06 - 00:05:01:10

Andrew Davies

You're more B2C type go to markets or go and do it themselves. Are those the kind of two other options in the marketplace or how else do you think about competition when it comes to message testing?

00:05:01:11 - 00:05:32:10

Peep Laja

Yeah, we're in this lucky position where we literally are the only one doing what we're doing today. And this is, of course, also no accident. I was searching for a differentiated business opportunity for four years. And so here I am, consumer research in B or C is extremely evolved. You know, like it got started in the 1960s and as a more than matured since B2B customer research is like two decades behind where like in Procter and Gamble they do insane amounts of consumer research.

00:05:32:10 - 00:05:54:02

Peep Laja

B2B companies do very little in comparison to do to consumer companies Previously, yeah, just like you said, for B2B companies to research what their target audience want. Let's say you sell down on AVP marketing's or product managers and you do know what they think about stuff and what they think about you in particular. It was very manual, tedious process and we've just made it much, much simpler.

00:05:54:02 - 00:06:02:14

Andrew Davies

What are the aims that you're trying to deliver for your clients? Is it conversion? Is it, you know, engagement? You know, how do you measure success for your clients really starts?

00:06:02:14 - 00:06:22:13

Peep Laja

Well, it depends on what are the goals of the customer, what are they trying to figure out. So main use cases are one, they're trying to improve their messaging. And of course the idea with if your messaging is better, you will see three things your conversion rate from like visit to leave or visit to trial start will increase.

00:06:22:13 - 00:06:44:03

Peep Laja

Absolutely, because they get it. They want it. It's working. Other things are more like on the brand level. People are able to refer you better if they understand what you do. If they maybe it's not for them, but they clearly understand and even like it as somebody on the sidelines. So you get more word of mouth, you get a better perception in the market.

00:06:44:03 - 00:07:05:15

Peep Laja

People think think more highly of of you. And then there's the customer research aspect. You know, any company, every company, I hope, is wondering what is their target customer think of want. And the better you understand your target customer, the better you're able to do product development, marketing, sales, all those things. You would think that also your sales close rates will go up and so on.

00:07:05:18 - 00:07:22:04

Andrew Davies

So before we get into perhaps, you know, what messaging is and the different frameworks you have behind the scenes and those of how you think about this, let's just start off with some definitions here, because I do think the word messaging, you know, it could be a bit like the word content to mean everything or nothing. So what does messaging mean to you when you talk about message testing?

00:07:22:04 - 00:07:40:03

Peep Laja

Yeah, so messaging is every company should basically figure out what is it that we want our target customer to know about us? And not all of those things are equal. So there's a hierarchy that's like the most important thing that they know about us is this. And then there's the second most important thing and the third most important thing.

00:07:40:03 - 00:08:01:16

Peep Laja

So it's like your messaging strategies, identifying which messages do we want to push out to the market, what's most important, And usually you want to have a list of, let's say three, maybe up to five key messages that you want to push, but three is a good number. But messaging is not copywriting. Yes, you communicate your messaging through words, but messaging is like a step before copy.

00:08:01:16 - 00:08:25:18

Peep Laja

It's more about what do we want to say, and then copies. Then using the exact word which exact words are we're going to use to communicate the idea. And sometimes what might happen is that the way you communicate an idea is done poorly. It is unclear, It's confusing. It's what you want to communicate is not resonating. So you want to tweak the wording, how you communicate it while the messaging strategy stays put.

00:08:25:18 - 00:08:55:02

Peep Laja

No, of course, messaging might also be wrong. Like you want to say, hey, where where the fastest pizza delivery in town. Let's say that's whatever what you care about, but nobody cares about it, for instance. So then you need to change your messaging first. Like we're trying to communicate the wrong idea. This is what you often see in B2B sites where everybody wants to create a category, and then you invent a fancy category name and say, Hey, you want the market optimization platform, right?

00:08:55:02 - 00:09:15:12

Peep Laja

And people like market optimization. No, I don't want that. And I actually think we should like maybe use, you know, simple language or change the way we talk about it. But messaging stems from positioning. And positioning is who are we for? Like what kind of like apps we're after and and what problems are we solving for them, What the use cases like.

00:09:15:19 - 00:09:43:00

Peep Laja

And the ICB, of course, also stems from who who is somebody who cares a lot about this value that we're trying to offer our value proposition. And I also think that the positioning then stems from your bigger strategic narrative of of the why like, well, what's going on in the world that makes us valuable and needed today and why the old ways were are not as effective anymore.

00:09:43:00 - 00:09:50:01

Ben Hillman

Next, Peep talks about the B2B messaging framework.

00:09:50:01 - 00:10:04:18

Andrew Davies

So if we just break that down, you've talked about the strategic narrative, you talked about positioning, you've talked about messaging, and then you've talked about copywriting. So if I got those in the right order of how you would go and approach this, any given business from strategic narrative to how you're positioned to what your messaging is then through your copywriting?

00:10:04:18 - 00:10:22:07

Peep Laja

That's exactly right. And a lot of people start from the wrong wrong and they start tweaking the words on the website to make it more compelling, which can give you a short term benefits, like if you're worth more effective, you might get more conversion, but they should start from the top, which is the strategic narrative. Of course, this is a sea level thing.

00:10:22:11 - 00:10:27:21

Peep Laja

You know, the CEO should drive the narrative and then we get the positioning and messaging.

00:10:27:22 - 00:10:42:09

Andrew Davies

As you know, I'm a big fan of, you know, spending time upfront on messaging and on positioning, certainly in a former role when I where I jumped into, you know, 15 or so SaaS businesses to help them with their demand. And I found it was the messaging that was probably the least optimized piece of what they were doing.

00:10:42:09 - 00:11:04:09

Andrew Davies

There's lots of optimization across their infrastructure and the the tactics and channels they were using. So let's just double click on messaging then. So I know you've got a B2B messaging layers kind of framework that you work through, starts at clarity, then relevance, then value, then differentI ation that leads to an outcome. So could you break that down for me and walk through the questions you were asking as you double click on messaging or what it is?

00:11:04:09 - 00:11:22:10

Peep Laja

So when I think about messaging, there are two two main components to it. Like, one is like what to say to begin with. And as you said, companies have dimension issues because messaging is often like, yeah, the channel is still matter. If the message is wrong and you can spend, you know, so much money or LinkedIn and then all the places.

00:11:22:10 - 00:11:43:00

Peep Laja

But like if what you're saying is these like Pammy, nobody cares about it, you have a problem. The message layers framework is a step assumes that you have found something that the market cares about. If you have found something that the market cares about now, is the how do we communicate it more effectively? Maybe were three great ideas that we want to communicate to the target buyer.

00:11:43:00 - 00:12:08:11

Peep Laja

And then we have four steps, four layers to that message, how to improve it. And my observation after after seeing how many hundreds messages the Wynter is that it's kind of a foolproof way to make any messaging, any message more effective, more resonant. And it starts with clarity in B2B size. You know, we like to say a lot of jargon, and even if you're writing copy, my first draft is often full of jargon.

00:12:08:11 - 00:12:24:18

Peep Laja

It's kind of like we want to use fancy words, and then it's like, Oh, actually I would never use this sentence in a conversation with my friend. So you shouldn't also send it, send that to the market because we're all human beings. So clarity, the main main idea here is if they don't get it, they're not going to care.

00:12:24:18 - 00:12:47:07

Peep Laja

So then if you jump, do fast two features and how we do add value and like, you know, like the mechanics of it, but I'm still unsure what the tool is, is like market optimization platform. And we have this feature and like I don't care about the feature, I still don't get it. What is it? So in clarity you want to always start with a category like what is it?

00:12:47:14 - 00:12:55:06

Peep Laja

All right, we're a payments infrastructures tool or you know, how do you communicate? What is paddle? Do you have a short way of saying it? You know, single lane payments.

00:12:55:06 - 00:13:02:00

Andrew Davies

Infrastructure versus is what we normally talk about or billing, subscription and tax for software companies. Either of those two, depending on how specific we want to be.

00:13:02:03 - 00:13:21:21

Peep Laja

So that is that is the perfect place to start, Let's say if it's a website like because a lot of customers have come on familiar with you also, like if you think about their future customers, a lot of them don't know that what you are. So you want to start with with the category and then you go into like the value proposition and like this is the key value that we offer or this is the pain we solve for you.

00:13:22:02 - 00:13:40:21

Peep Laja

So people know, you know, basically what box to put you in. People want to put you in a box because it's like we like stereotyping and you should let them. If you fail to define yourself accurately, people will care. So you need to define yourself. So clarity is most important once people understand what is it? Oh, it's this too.

00:13:40:21 - 00:14:03:00

Peep Laja

Oh, it's marketing automation. Or as you know, it's whatever it is, then they're ready for the next step. And the next step is, is this for me? So it's relevance. Ideally, you very quickly want to communicate is one of one of two things. So like who is the ICP? So we are for e-commerce companies or small e-commerce companies using Shopify in a very specific the more specific the better.

00:14:03:00 - 00:14:18:06

Peep Laja

And so it really also depends on if you have clearly defined your ICP and the clearer it is, the better able you are to communicate it. Or it might be that if you have this problem doesn't need to be, you might be a horizontal product. So there is no one single buyer, but there's a problem that you sell for it.

00:14:18:06 - 00:14:34:14

Peep Laja

Do you have I know payroll compliance issues are not in this wording, but the you know, like people understand I yes, hiring people from all over the world is a pain due to the compliance and tax issues. So I understand the pain and now I understand that you are for me. You help me meet me with this problem.

00:14:34:14 - 00:14:55:13

Peep Laja

So relevancy once people understand that what it is and is this for me and hopefully the answer is yes, then we are ready for the rest of it. And now starts when I call value or motivation. So people come with certain intrinsic motivation, right? They have a certain level of interest and they might or might not be ready to sign up already before they land on your website.

00:14:55:14 - 00:15:23:05

Peep Laja

Now, with the motivation layer or the value layer you want to increase, use and motivation to take action. I spent the last decade in experimentation, conversion optimization and things like that, and what I learned was that increasing user motivation is many times more powerful and decreasing friction. A lot of optimization people spend their time minimizing friction on this to reduce form fields and, you know, things like that make it easier.

00:15:23:05 - 00:15:42:15

Peep Laja

And yes, it does help to an extent, but it's far more important to make people want to take action. The best way to get somebody to take action is to make them want to do it. And so how do you do that? You do it through words. And so this is you communicating your value proposition. You're painting the future with you.

00:15:42:18 - 00:16:02:19

Peep Laja

And I like that you tease the promised land, so they should go and like, Oh, that sounds amazing. I want that. And if they're not like, Oh, I want that, then you've lost, you know, a conversion rate is going to be very low. And a lot of SaaS companies only rely on people's intrinsic motivation. They do very little to increase their motivation, which is a big problem.

00:16:03:02 - 00:16:22:00

Peep Laja

And so, yeah, so you do what you can to make them want to take action. And the final piece is once they get it, they understand it's for them and they want the value that is being promised is differentiation, especially if you're in a mature category. Let's say it's no email marketing. You know, there's 500 tools according to G2.

00:16:22:10 - 00:16:45:00

Peep Laja

If you say send beautiful email newsletters, you're like, Well, I mean, every tool does that. I mean, I already have MailChimp, so why would I need you? Because switching is a pain, right? Switching tools if you're doing greenfield marketing, like you're not replacing anyone, you know? Great, fantastic. But most of us are replacing something. They're already doing something.

00:16:45:12 - 00:17:10:15

Peep Laja

And so it needs to be very clear. Why choose you over the status quo, over the category leader for sure? Like if the category leader is say, MailChimp, how are you better or whatever the status quo is. So so again, in most B2B SaaS companies don't even mention their competition. They like to pretend that they're the only one doing what they're doing, even if they're in a mature, a very competitive category.

00:17:10:15 - 00:17:32:00

Andrew Davies

We've gone through a few steps there. So clarity, what is it? Relevance. Is it for me value? You know, Do I want it? How bad do I want it? And then that differentiation, why this versus other things if you were then going to use this framework. So let's let's just imagine you've just sold Wynter for a couple of billion and you're now you're moving in to maybe do some consulting post, post setting on the beach.

00:17:32:00 - 00:17:41:00

Andrew Davies

You're going to take over a company's messaging today. What sort of tests are going to put in place? Where do you start out if you're walking into an established organization to bring this framework to bear?

00:17:41:01 - 00:18:00:01

Peep Laja

There's four steps. You can check how your current messaging is doing for each of these four layers using a like a scale. So on a scale of 1 to 5. So for instance, and this can be a for the whole pitch or just the last section off of your site or a small landing page. So let's say we take that above the fold area of the website.

00:18:00:01 - 00:18:15:09

Peep Laja

For instance, I would ask the target customer after reading this, how would you rate the clarity of this? Like how well do you think you understand this? And they say, Oh, I understand you four out of five, you know, it's pretty good. I think I get it, but it's not a five. And then you want those. Also the open ended feedback.

00:18:15:09 - 00:18:43:10

Peep Laja

Well, what about it is unclear What about it? So you always want to mix and match quant and qual. So like it's scale and open ended and I will do the same thing for for instance, differentiation. Like how differentiated do you think this offer is or how unique this, this offer is this this company, this product? And then open ended would be why choose this company over others and see if they get the reason And of course if they don't get it, if they don't know the reason why choose you is because you haven't given them one.

00:18:43:20 - 00:18:59:03

Peep Laja

All right. And so we need to give them one. And same for relevancy. Do you understand who this is for? Please explain who this is for. And then you see if it's correct. If they if they got it, then again, if they don't know, you haven't spelled it out for them. And same for value, especially if it's like for value.

00:18:59:03 - 00:19:20:10

Peep Laja

I like to ask how interested are you in getting a demo with them or how we just value in signing up with them on a five point scale and then ask them for an explanation. And if you get that data back, it's going to be extremely rich, you understand? Exactly. In which of these four dimensions are you falling short and how much, and then what specifically needs to be improved.

00:19:20:17 - 00:19:30:02

Peep Laja

Oh, we're not explaining who were before or the clarity needs that needs to be tightened.

00:19:30:02 - 00:19:37:10

Ben Hillman

And now it talks about doing routine maintenance on your messaging.

00:19:37:10 - 00:19:47:18

Andrew Davies

How do you think about making sure this becomes part of normal process? Policy procedure culture within a business is it's like, you know, do you have ways of establishing that as norm within a business.

00:19:47:18 - 00:20:04:16

Peep Laja

Working on it when like 20 years ago people didn't even use web analytics and now it's like, oh, of course. I mean, who would it use? Weapon analytics is crazy, right? With what if we don't know what's happening on the website? What I'm working on is also you should have the same reaction like about the words on your website, words.

00:20:04:16 - 00:20:22:06

Peep Laja

The messaging is most of your conversion rate comes from that because you communicate using words. So you need to measure the effectiveness of your words. And it's the same situation as it was with Let's say, before Google Analytics. How well on my words, working. No idea. That's insane, right? So we should do something about it is an education process.

00:20:22:07 - 00:20:43:13

Peep Laja

So really the process that every company should be before we ship any piece of messaging, we publish a new landing page, we will launch a new virtual event or we're about to before you put it out there, you test if they get it, if they understand it, that's for them. If they want their the value, if they're interested in signing up and like, is it is it differentiated, that should be the workflow.

00:20:43:13 - 00:20:48:01

Peep Laja

Like before you hit the publish on, you'll see a mess. Or are you a landing page builder? You tested first.

00:20:48:01 - 00:21:01:21

Andrew Davies

But is that really possible in a world where we're putting landing pages up all the time and testing lots of different, you know, is there a scale in which you don't need to do that or do you are you a purist over this, that every new interaction that you're putting in front of a customer should be tested?

00:21:01:21 - 00:21:26:11

Peep Laja

The research is also a cost for sure. There's a cost of money and time. And so there are there needs to be an equation of is this a high stakes situation or not? So if you publish a new F a Q page or about US page, those are not critical pages for for customer journey. So customer journey, of course, your whole page and maybe you have like detailed use case pages or features, but those are the money pages.

00:21:26:18 - 00:21:46:06

Peep Laja

And also if you drive a lot of expensive PPC traffic to a landing page, that's a money page. So on all those pages where it really matters that you get those conversions, those signups, whatever you're trying to get the purchases, those pages you absolutely need to test. Because if a conversion rate is 2% but it could be less 70% higher, I mean, that's this is just an intentional waste.

00:21:46:06 - 00:21:58:05

Peep Laja

You know, like you're stupid when it don't have to be. So you do that math is am I spending money driving traffic to this page? Is this critical page in buyer's journey before signing up? And for those pages, you absolutely need to run some message.

00:21:58:05 - 00:22:19:18

Andrew Davies

Just so I'm interested in the interplay between message testing and experimentation. My previous role I was running brand name on and digital for optimize. Early experimentation kind of bleeds through the DNA of that company. Everything we were doing, we were showing multiple experiments, doing multivariate testing, getting user feedback on different versions through quality control. And that's probably the most mature experimentation culture I've been part of.

00:22:19:20 - 00:22:27:22

Andrew Davies

So talk to me about how experimentation plays off with this type of message testing, which could be a bit set and forget, you know, how often do you do this, how many things you testing.

00:22:27:22 - 00:22:47:08

Peep Laja

Message testing and a B testing worked beautifully together. HIV testing, you know, tells you if B is better than A and by how much is a measurement methodology, it does not tell you why or what's more likely to work better. You don't know that upfront. That's that's why you also test, right? Because we want to know what works better.

00:22:47:08 - 00:23:07:06

Peep Laja

So message testing is what you do before a, b, testing. It's almost that's part of your hypothesis creation. You know, you probably want to test. You improve the conversion rate on your home page or, you know, whatever it is you do message testing first, you understand the problems and then you ship the improvements, which all the hypotheses. I think this will make it more clearer.

00:23:07:07 - 00:23:28:22

Peep Laja

I think this will, you know, improve the motivation. But does it if you have the traffic volume for it, then now you run the new and improved version against control. Did we improve these things and does it does it make us more money? For instance, if you're in beta, besides, a lot of B2B SaaS companies don't get a lot of transaction volume, like how many demos per week or per month are you are you getting so broad?

00:23:29:02 - 00:23:51:11

Peep Laja

I mean, this is statistics, you know, sample size calculation issue. But if you get broadly speaking, if you get under 500 sign ups or demos per month, you can't really run them in a single AB test because, well, you could run it, but the outcome is going to be most likely inconclusive. So you still don't know, even though you put all this effort in there where for four weeks it's just slowing it out.

00:23:51:15 - 00:23:57:16

Peep Laja

And so with message testing, which is a form of quantitative research, you don't need large sample sizes. And so you just go with that.

00:23:57:16 - 00:24:05:12

Andrew Davies

Your threshold is if end is less than five hundreds, then message testing should be a primary approach. And if end is over 500, then you can use the two in kind of parallel.

00:24:05:12 - 00:24:09:00

Peep Laja

That's part of pre-testing and feeds into your test hypothesis.

00:24:09:01 - 00:24:28:09

Andrew Davies

Mm hmm. Let's talk about some examples. Hey, you know, maybe can you talk to me about the best example of of of a B2B, you know, business that have gone through this process and you think have got the Christmas message that you point to or perhaps more and perhaps a turnaround you've seen where people have used an approach like this and changed what their message is and seen results as a result.

00:24:28:09 - 00:24:47:11

Peep Laja

There are case studies. I know well and then there are gay studies that I'm not sure I can disclose what was going on. But like if you want to see a page with crisp messaging where it's clear what they do and you know, is it for and they're doing quite a bit to drive people's motivation, check out Bloom Tech.

00:24:47:11 - 00:24:58:04

Peep Laja

It's like a kind of a learn how to be a coder. I think that is a really well done page where you when we tested that, it scored almost perfect scores by its target audience.

00:24:58:04 - 00:25:00:05

Andrew Davies

What's the what's the domain name? You know should.

00:25:00:05 - 00:25:06:18

Peep Laja

Be bloom tech dot com I'm thinking bloom is in the flower bloom tech bloom.

00:25:06:18 - 00:25:12:00

Andrew Davies

Tech dot com fantastic I'm having a look at it right now launch a tech career on your schedule that sound right.

00:25:12:02 - 00:25:29:19

Peep Laja

That's right exactly yeah and we pay you to finish our the school and then it's like what they do is that you can study this that and so on. And then it's the value proposition is like we get you a job and it's a high paying job. Yeah. And you don't pay until you get a job that pays a certain amount of money.

00:25:29:19 - 00:25:32:00

Peep Laja

Yeah, it's a pretty attractive value proposition there.

00:25:32:00 - 00:25:42:09

Andrew Davies

How about, you know, a turnaround you've seen or a year? Maybe it's from one of your case studies or you've seen it on the open market where people have really transformed business value as a result of tightening The kind of things we're talking about.

00:25:42:09 - 00:26:15:14

Peep Laja

Turnaround maybe is the wrong word, but companies who have done extensive message testing. So let's take app cues, which is onboarding product adoption SaaS tool is a product lead. And so for them the key metric is try start. We do it very like a series of message tests on their home page, on their features pages with it, their audience, audiences on multiple surveys, trying to understand if product managers and product marketers are about to sign up for an onboarding tool, like what's the most important thing that they care about?

00:26:15:14 - 00:26:55:16

Peep Laja

And so on and so forth. So based on those customer insights and understanding what really seems to resonate on their site or not, we basically help them rework their messaging. And the outcome was that they, they increase their visit to trial starts by like more than 70%. 70% is a significant number or what they call agonism, which is a kind of a zoom in for alternative where they pimped they they're trying to get a bit of my paid ads that are on page sort of landing pages and the same thing iterated message tests and their conversion rates went up about 40%, which again, at their scale, 40% is it's a significant lift.

00:26:55:21 - 00:27:12:09

Andrew Davies

Lot both of those companies. And and how they've matured their messaging over the last couple of years is really cool. If we go back to these layers and the four layers you talked about here. So clarity, relevance, value and differentiation for people who are in a rush and, you know, many of our listeners are are there any of those that they should skip or that they should make sure they focus on?

00:27:12:09 - 00:27:18:03

Andrew Davies

Is one more important than the other? Or do you believe this framework you've got a walk through from beginning to end and focus on all four of those?

00:27:18:03 - 00:27:44:08

Peep Laja

Clarity is number one, as I said before, if they don't get it, the rest doesn't really matter. So if it if you only have the time, for whatever reason to improve one thing like improved clarity. So use simple language, make sure people it's clear what it is and so on. But working on the other things like also make make sure who was it for and make sure we we communicate accurately like the the value that we deliver.

00:27:44:17 - 00:27:46:00

Peep Laja

You know you will have more lift.

00:27:50:20 - 00:27:59:00

Ben Hillman

Next Peep talks about expanding audience while balancing supply and demand.

00:27:59:00 - 00:28:18:17

Andrew Davies

I know you are creating lots of content as you kind of go into the second year of your business and ramp up your audience. You've got that. Do you resonate LinkedIn live, You've got your podcast, you still got the CSL Live Conference, which I see was run out of your previous business. If that's right. How do you finding your own resonance with this audience you're building?

00:28:18:17 - 00:28:33:02

Andrew Davies

It feels like this is very much of a moment where there's a bunch of marketers reaching a stage of maturity where this is rising up the list of things to do. So are you finding you find that across any specific sectors, any specific types of business and talk to me about building that community.

00:28:33:02 - 00:28:56:01

Peep Laja

With or is a start up and a bootstrapped startup. I cannot outspend, you know, other people in the market when it comes to like startup problems. I have classic startup problems which are not enough. People know that we exist. So awareness is a key marketing challenge. Over the last ten years, I've always been a content creator. I was a blogger, you know, ten years ago already, and so on and so forth.

00:28:56:01 - 00:29:27:07

Peep Laja

And so I've built up social media like following on Twitter and LinkedIn today for Wynter, when when I look at my sales pipeline and what's the source for that? I want to say like 80% is my organic LinkedIn content than the drive. So we have we use self-reported attribution and when you schedule a demo or sign up for Wynter app and ask like Will ages about us, and I want to say around 80% is or is referencing LinkedIn or organic content for me specifically.

00:29:27:12 - 00:29:48:03

Peep Laja

So I am posting every single day allow. I want you as a founder wasting time on social media. I mean, this is marketing. I'm building pipeline as the number one responsibility of a CEO is to make sure the company does not run out of money. I am still and you know, I have two marketers in the Wynter team, but I'm still the CMO as well.

00:29:48:06 - 00:29:53:06

Peep Laja

Common in early stage startups. It just makes sense. And I see those that makes money before.

00:29:53:06 - 00:30:10:11

Andrew Davies

We kind of come to a few final questions to close ten year behind the scenes of what's actually happening here. So I'm assuming so this is a bit of a two sided marketplace where you've got a bunch of people who are feeding back on the on the tests that are being run. How do you find those people? How do you check that they're giving good opinions, that they've got good experience to give them from?

00:30:10:11 - 00:30:14:18

Andrew Davies

You know, and talk to me about that, the challenges as well as the opportunities of that two sided marketplace.

00:30:14:18 - 00:30:38:00

Peep Laja

We're like Uber riders are drivers, except we have size vendors and people buy software. So so it is a two sided marketplace. How do we get the audience right? The people side is through marketing. Just like Uber advertises to recruit more drivers, we advertise to recruit more people with jobs who buy software. And how we do that is, let's say we start with a specific role in an industry.

00:30:38:01 - 00:30:59:02

Peep Laja

Let's say we want to recruit more directors of our human resources in B2B sites. And so then what we do is like we identify which media targeted media they're consuming, like which newsletters they're part of, what slack groups they're in, things like that. And then we advertise in those very specific communities. That's the key driver of audience growth because the value proposition is pretty good.

00:30:59:02 - 00:31:14:09

Peep Laja

It's like, Hey, do you want to occasionally share your what you think about stuff and we pay your money. And these days it seems like everybody is going to have a side hustle and slow commitment. It's an easy sell. What I'm saying, it doesn't replace their day job, but it always pays for their one for their wine and cheese.

00:31:14:09 - 00:31:32:14

Peep Laja

A key challenge here is, I mean, certain roles are harder to get than than others because we have to balance the needs of both sides of the marketplace. So we have a lot of differences, a lot of interest, cybersecurity role, chief information security officers, things like that. So there's a lot companies ready to pay us money if we only get these audience.

00:31:32:20 - 00:31:55:02

Peep Laja

So that audience, for instance, has been more difficult to get. We need to pay them more money and things like that. And then there are industries that are not even very online that if you could imagine such a thing. So construction tech is a massive category, like billions and billions that they really want to give us money and they want to target construction industry people.

00:31:55:02 - 00:32:17:14

Peep Laja

And it's been very difficult to recruit so far. So we actually haven't been able to build out large enough audiences in that sector because there are not enough like online communities and newsletters and things like that for for men at construction sites. And it's also a world that I'm I don't know too much about. I need to do more is to get somebody, an insider from that industry to help me recruit the audience.

00:32:17:14 - 00:32:24:18

Peep Laja

And so whereas B2B sites marketers, I mean, all day long, they're everywhere, right? So that that's kind of the key challenge there.

00:32:24:18 - 00:32:38:12

Andrew Davies

Is it would I be right in saying that because you're bootstrapped, then often this is demand before supply. And so you're going and finding companies who have the, you know, budget capacity and interest in using your services and then making sure you have the supply of audience to be able to deliver them value.

00:32:38:12 - 00:33:01:13

Peep Laja

Exactly right. So I start with like, who is ready to give us money if we only had their ICP and, and I started with B2B SaaS because it's an industry I know well, I understand the people have access to them. So we started from there. Every day. I'm turning down money from people who want to target people who work in agriculture or mining oil and gas, public utilities, things like that.

00:33:01:18 - 00:33:27:12

Peep Laja

Those are like in my on my list eventually get there if I'm convinced that there is enough supply. So enough demand, because another thing I need to balance is, let's say the guy $100,000 and I invest building out this manufacturing audience. So I need to give them enough studies to be part of enough. Companies need to demand their will, request their feedback, because if that feedback is not frequent enough, the panel side, they will churn.

00:33:27:13 - 00:33:46:17

Peep Laja

And so I need to take into account this churn dynamics. It costs money to recruit audiences, but if if I don't give them enough to do, they'll churn and then I've wasted my money. So I need to be very careful of balancing my sales and marketing and audience recruitment at the same time. It's it's not easy, but it's fun.

00:33:46:20 - 00:34:05:10

Andrew Davies

You're touching on a super interesting topic, which many businesses face in SaaS businesses, if they're scaling fast, face it more frequently. The others, which is how do they deal with market expansion? What is that next segment? How do we identify? It's how do we go and, you know, ensure it's big enough and how do we build product or in your case, you know, the other side of the audience in order to go and serve it.

00:34:05:11 - 00:34:12:13

Andrew Davies

So is there any mental models or any any kind of rules of thumb that you use in terms of mapping out those next few segments to go and investigate?

00:34:12:19 - 00:34:52:04

Peep Laja

My my approach is fairly simple and straightforward Here is like I'm expanding the number of ISP's I sell to. So I started with a single ICP, which is like a B2B SaaS, VIP marketing CMO type of person, and now I'm like, Well, if I can I sell to h.R. Or like a writer, I sell to marketers, but they so I'm not expanding in terms of who was my buyer, but rather what they sell like do so one ICP at a time and the down the line my my future vision is you know like to be able to offer any title in any industry, you know, you want security warehouse security people in Bolivia here, here

00:34:52:04 - 00:35:07:07

Peep Laja

you go eventually. So it's pretty straightforward. In my case here, like do do I have more, I suppose, to offer? Because then I can service more industries or more companies.

00:35:07:07 - 00:35:15:16

Ben Hillman

And now Peep talks about his unexpected beginnings as a serial entrepreneur.

00:35:15:16 - 00:35:33:07

Andrew Davies

Let's just go right back to the very beginning of your journey before we finish up here. So I'm fascinated. You're a serial entrepreneur. You know, you had sex sell. You've now go Wynter. I don't know much about the story before that. What led you to starting a business and being a CEO? Was it something in your background, upbringing, parents like?

00:35:33:07 - 00:35:34:06

Andrew Davies

What led you to this point?

00:35:34:06 - 00:36:00:19

Peep Laja

It's hard to know. Like, my dad was an unemployed alcoholic and my my mom was, as a doctor, a virologist, you know, having a steady job, not entrepreneurial at all. So I don't know. What about upbringing? If you read about entrepreneurs, there's a common theme of hardship experiencing hardship when growing up. And, you know, I was born in Estonia, I grew up in Estonia that at the time of my birth was occupied by Russia.

00:36:00:19 - 00:36:23:23

Peep Laja

Then, you know, once we regained our independence, there was a switch from central planning economy to a market economy. And, you know, it was like a hyperinflation of thousand percent a year. And so economically also, it was very difficult times. You know, we were poor food scarcity, things like that. So experienced a lot of hardship. Also, like my mom, dad, she was the breadwinner of the family and she didn't make a lot of money.

00:36:23:23 - 00:36:42:19

Peep Laja

And so I kind of saw that and that and the kind of like instilled like I need to make money, Like I'm not going to be like my my father was and this is a I don't know if life if that's the reason or not. Once I was in my twenties, I was I was always very proactive, like coming up with stuff, you know, initiative.

00:36:42:19 - 00:37:05:15

Peep Laja

And then like when I was 27, I moved to I already had a remote job. I was ahead of the times and I moved to Panama because I couldn't live anywhere. I wanted to learn Spanish, so I moved to Panama, a one way ticket, and the company that was my employed me. They ran out of money and it was like they were financed by Anita Roddick, who died of cancer, the founder of Body Shop.

00:37:05:15 - 00:37:25:18

Peep Laja

And so then I found myself in Panama with no income at first to try to get a job in the local market. But my my Spanish wasn't good enough. And after hearing I was pitching myself as an SEO BPC guy, do like real estate companies and tourist agencies and so on. And they told me, Well, we do need what you offer, but not full time.

00:37:25:18 - 00:37:45:14

Peep Laja

And after hearing that, that rejection like six, seven times, I'm like, Wow, what if I offer this as a service? And so over a weekend I built like a WordPress website saying that, oh, it's like Panama Internet marketing, sales services, and then I emailed the same companies interviewed with and say, Hey, I'm now offering this as a service.

00:37:45:14 - 00:37:50:19

Peep Laja

And I landed my first customers. And so that's how I became an entrepreneur back in 2007.

00:37:50:20 - 00:38:10:21

Andrew Davies

Because they say necessity is the mother of invention. I really appreciate the time today. Is there anything you want to leave with the audience? So we've got a lot of listeners here who will be bootstrap founders just like yourself, who are grappling with market entry, grappling with trying to build more people, using mostly their product led businesses. What would be the tips that you'd leave with them as they as we finish up this episode, most.

00:38:10:21 - 00:38:36:22

Peep Laja

Startups compete in like mature or saturated spaces, and it's very hard to win. Like, you cannot beat Category kings, you cannot it's very hard to be more innovative than like doing an innovation. You likely don't have the money for it. You likely can't outspend others with advertising. So really, the way you can win as a as a small startup is by telling a better story, doing stronger messaging, positioning.

00:38:36:22 - 00:38:46:22

Peep Laja

And so basically winning are things beyond the product. So I would I would recommend those startup advisors to learn more about those things. And if anybody wants to hit me out, then you can find LinkedIn.

00:38:46:22 - 00:38:52:20

Andrew Davies

Thank you so much for that. I love that note to end on. Let's Make sure everyone wins by telling a better story. Really appreciate your time today.

00:38:53:06 - 00:38:57:16

Peep Laja

My pleasure. Thank you for having me.

00:38:57:16 - 00:39:21:16

Ben Hillman

We're grateful to have for doing this podcast. Now, you've had a crash course on messaging today. We talked about what good messaging really means, the B2B messaging framework, doing routine maintenance on your messaging, expanding audience while balancing supply and demand, and Peep's unexpected beginnings as a serial entrepreneur. Make sure to give Protect the Hustle a five star review, and tell us what lesson Peep taught you from today's episode.

00:39:22:02 - 00:39:31:16

Ben Hillman

Thanks for listening. Subscribe to and tell your friends about Protect the Hustle, a podcast from Battle Studios dedicated to helping you build better SaaS.