8 Missions That Power Revenue Growth
This is our roadmap. A clear, proven path to get real and sustainable traction for our startup.
It’s built on the real journeys of over 1,000 tech companies — like Cursor, ElevenLabs, DeepL, LambdaLabs, and Canva— that scaled from $0 to $100M ARR in just a few years.
This roadmap breaks the quest into 8 missions:
1
ICP: Know exactly who you’re building for
2
MVP: Solve the ICP problem with just enough product
3
Pricing & Packaging : Make your offer clear and irresistible
4
Founder-led Growth: Hone the skills to get traction yourself
5
GTM Metrics: Know what to measure (and what to ignore)
6
GTM Org Structure: Start building/hiring a team that grows revenue
7
GTM Process: Build repeatability into your motion
8
Predictability: Lay the groundwork for scale to $100M
Product-Market Fit and Go-To-Market Fit
During the quest, AI startups will go through two major maturity phases.
The first one is Product-Market Fit, and the second one is Go-To-Market Fit
The Product-Market Fit (PMF) Loop
We achieve Product-Market Fit by iterating through Missions 1 to 4
During this stage, the team remains rather small (3 to 10 people in the whole company).
We are trying to hit the following metrics:
- Relatively easy growth (Lead Generation Cost or CAC decreased massively)
- High retention (90% of renewals are successful)
- ARR is between $500K to $3M (depending on the GTM motion)
To achieve these metrics, we will iterate constantly between missions 1 and 4, the MVP will dramatically change at least 10 to 20 times, while we are also iterating the way we approach our marketing, sales, and customer success. Both go hand in hand.
Up until PMF is achieved, the founder is the main person in charge of generating leads, selling, onboarding, renewing, and expanding.
Getting our first paying customers
We usually earn our first customers after a few good iterations through Missions 1 to 4.
These early believers might churn as we keep shaping the product (and the way we speak about it) but they help us move forward. Each step brings us closer to Product-Market Fit.
Don’t skip this. Seriously.
If we only go through Missions 1 to 4 once and expect that to bring paying customers, we’re fooling ourselves.
Most startups stall right here. Not because the idea is bad, but because they stop learning too soon.
This is where I can help you the most: to iterate, refine, and keep moving until things click.
Ignore this part, and we risk building something clever that no body wants.
Go-To-Market Fit (GTMF)
We achieve Go-To-Market Fit by working through Missions 5 – 8
When PMF is achieved, usually the founders have enough capital (sometimes raising a Seed or Series A round) and knowledge to hire their first sales reps, marketing managers, CSMs, etc…
And at this point, if the founder has not been diligent enough by documenting all their learnings, revenue generation and growth are at risk.
The GTMF phase is about being able to hire the right people, train/onboard them with the right knowledge, and then, coach them to be almost as effective as the founder was during the Founder-Led Growth Mission.
As we move forward through the missions, we’re not just building a business, you’re becoming the kind of founder who can take it all the way to $100M in ARR.
With the tools. The knowledge. The habits.
And a battle-tested companion by your side.
Let’s get to work.