A CMO's First Year at a $2.4B Valuated SaaS

Executive Conversations

Hello again listeners! Welcome to another episode of the SaaS Leader Interview Series!

This week, we’re talking to Andrew Davies about his first year heading up marketing at Paddle, a $2.4 billion valued company that helps SaaS businesses set up, run, and scale their payment infrastructure.

We discuss the challenges he’s faced and the changes he’s made to grow the marketing department in three distinct areas:

• Product marketing, including customer marketing and the website itself
• Demand gen, which involves managing business development representative (BDR) teams
• Branding, which deals with the brand’s reputation, reach, and engagement with the wider market

Paddle has grown extremely rapidly, riding the pre-and post-covid wave of software and infrastructure investment. This year, it acquired ProfitWell, an analytics and retention tools business, along with its customer base and teams.

Andrew tells us how he’s helped Paddle get to the next level by:

• Merging the marketing departments of the two companies.
• Broadening marketing efforts across distinct channels
• Expanding the tactics of the BDR team to include direct mail and outbound calling
• Improving branding recognition with an expanded PR strategy

Tune in to find out what it’s like to be CMO during the rapid growth stage of a $2.4 billion SaaS company.

In this episode we talk about:

• Marketing leadership
• Managing business and departmental growth
• SaaS marketing and SEO

Timestamps:

00:06 - 03:06: Paddle’s participation in SaaStock and SaaStr this year

03:06 - 07:22: The challenges Andrew has faced since joining Paddle

07:22 - 11:18: Changes Andrew has made to the marketing department

11:18 - 19:30: Where Andrew has doubled down or cut back on existing marketing efforts

22:49 - 25:34: Wrap-up

About Andrew Davies

Andrew Davies is currently Chief Marketing Office at Paddle. Previously, he was Head of Brand & Digital at Episerver after it acquired Idio, which he co-founded in November 2019. He also supports and invests in early-stage startups, helping them solve issues around proposition development, teams, and B2B/SaaS marketing.

Connect with Andrew Davies on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andjdavies/
Connect with Maeva on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maevaeverywhere

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