Should we run free trial or demo-led?

Depends on ACV. Under Rs. 50K ARR per customer, free trial with PLG onboarding wins. Above Rs. 2L ARR, demo-led with a human in the loop converts 3-5x better. Between, you usually need both with self-serve as the qualification and demo as the close. The audit asks how high your trial-to-paid conversion is - under 5% means broken activation, demo-led is faster.

Industry · SaaS

You are an Indian SaaS founder. The US incumbents own page one and ChatGPT.

Marketing for SaaS founders building from India, selling to India or to the world. Demand engine on content, SEO, LinkedIn, GEO. Demo and trial funnel that does not leak between MQL and close. Pricing review that stops Indian SaaS underpricing what is actually built. Built for the founder running 5-50 people, ARR between Rs. 1Cr and Rs. 20Cr, who cannot outspend Salesforce, HubSpot, or Notion, and should stop trying.

Audit my SaaS funnel→ See related lead engines

SQL

Volume tracked, not MQL vanity

12-18 mo

Realistic content compounding horizon

India + global

Buying contexts both handled

Founder-led

Distribution that beats budget

[ 01 / What is included ]

Six pieces of the SaaS marketing stack.

SaaS does not need more channels, it needs an engine where each piece feeds the next.

ICP and positioning

Indian SMB or global mid-market is the first fork. Most Indian SaaS sells to both badly and to neither well. The doc names ARR per segment, role, trigger, and competitor displacement story.

Demand engine

Content + SEO + LinkedIn + GEO running as one funnel. Founder-led LinkedIn drives top of funnel, long-form on your domain converts intent, GEO and AEO get you cited inside ChatGPT and Perplexity before the buyer hits Google.

Paid and ABM

Retargeting on Meta and LinkedIn. Lookalike off paid customers. G2 and Capterra intent if your category is on them. ABM on a tight named-account list when ACV justifies it. Cold prospecting only when channel-fit actually maps.

Demo and trial funnel

Where most Indian SaaS leaks money. Trial activation tracking, demo no-show recovery, deal-stage automation, WhatsApp follow-up for Indian buyers, email cadences for global. Stage conversion rates measured weekly.

Pricing and packaging review

Most Indian SaaS underprices by 30-50%. Tiering, annual discounting, usage-based add-ons, regional pricing for US vs India buyers. The review pulls competitor pricing and willingness-to-pay data.

Reporting and attribution

An honest dashboard: CAC by channel, payback period, SQL-to-paid conversion, MRR by cohort, churn. Multi-touch attribution because last-click lies for SaaS. Friday WhatsApp summary with the trend.

[ 02 / Process ]

How a SaaS engagement runs.

01 · AUDIT

Find the funnel leak

Stage-by-stage conversion from anonymous visitor to closed-won, tracked in your CRM. The biggest drop-off is rarely where the founder thinks it is.

02 · POSITION

Pick the segment

Indian SMB vs global mid-market vs vertical SaaS in a niche. One pick, one positioning, one ICP doc. Subtraction beats addition at this stage.

03 · SHIP

Engine and funnel together

Demand engine across content / SEO / LinkedIn, demo funnel automated end-to-end. Both built in parallel because content without conversion is a museum and conversion without content is a campaign.

04 · ITERATE

Monthly cohort review

CAC, payback, retention by cohort. What is improving, what is not. Channel re-allocation every month, not every quarter.

[ 03 / Comparison ]

Indian operator vs. US growth agency vs. head of growth hire.

What matters for SaaS	Me	US growth agency	VP / Head of Growth hire
Monthly cost	Rs. 1.5-4L	$5K-15K (Rs. 4-12L)	Rs. 40-80L salary annual
Time to first ship	2-3 weeks	4-8 weeks onboarding	3 months ramp
Understands Indian SMB buying	Yes - WhatsApp-first, phone-led	Built for US email cadences	Depends on the hire
Understands global SaaS buying	Yes - documented across clients	Native	Depends on the hire
Covers content + paid + CRM + automation	Full stack	Usually one channel	Briefs specialists
Disposable when not needed	Stop anytime	Retainer lock-in	Layoffs are expensive

[ 04 / Proof ]

Lead engines that ship the way SaaS engines need to.

Three projects with the funnel discipline a SaaS demand engine demands: clear ICP, instrumented stages, automated handoffs.

See all 18 case studies→

[ 05 / Engagement ]

Three ways to bring me into your SaaS.

▽

Funnel audit

1-2 weeks

Stage-by-stage funnel from anonymous to closed-won. CAC by channel, payback by cohort, drop-off points named with hypotheses. Written plan with the 3 highest-ROI fixes for your shape of SaaS.

◇

Demand engine sprint

8-12 weeks

Positioning rewritten, ICP narrowed, demand engine launched across content + SEO + LinkedIn + GEO, demo funnel automated, attribution set up. First MRR uplift cohort attributable inside the engagement.

◈

Fractional head of marketing

ongoing

I run marketing or partner with your head of growth. Weekly leadership meeting, monthly cohort review, quarterly OKR reset. Specialists briefed when needed. The SaaS team that punches above its budget.

[ 06 / FAQ ]

The questions every SaaS founder asks.

Budgets are 5-10x smaller. Indian buyers prefer WhatsApp and phone over email. The biggest SEO and LinkedIn queries are dominated by US incumbents with deep content moats. Indian SMB pricing tolerance is lower, so unit economics live or die on retention. The playbook: pick a defensible niche, build a content moat in 12-18 months, run founder-led LinkedIn, sell on WhatsApp, price for retention.

Depends on ACV. Under Rs. 50K ARR per customer, free trial with PLG onboarding wins. Above Rs. 2L ARR, demo-led with a human in the loop converts 3-5x better. Between, you usually need both - self-serve as qualification, demo as the close. Under 5% trial-to-paid conversion means activation is broken, and demo-led is faster.

SQL volume and SQL-to-paid conversion, not MQLs. CAC by channel, payback period, net new MRR. Demo conversion rate, trial activation rate, time-to-value. Vanity metrics like impressions and sessions only matter when they correlate to qualified pipeline, which I check monthly against the CRM.

Selectively. Retargeting works. Lookalike audiences off your paid customer list work. Intent platforms like G2 and Capterra work if your category is on them. Cold prospecting on Meta and Google rarely pays back for SaaS over Rs. 2L ARR - the audience is too broad. Channel-fit map first, then we know whether to spend at all.

Yes when the work is remote-first, which mine is. Lower cost than a US growth agency, faster turn time than an offshore team, and I write in the buyer's voice not Indian SaaS-marketing voice. Several Indian SaaS founders ship outbound and content for US and EU buyers - the playbook is documented.

That is the most common shape. I act as fractional head of marketing or head of growth, run the channels you do not have a specialist for, and brief in freelancers when needed. The weekly cadence and OKRs are how a small team punches above its weight.

[ 07 / Related ]

Services SaaS founders pull together.

Services that drive SaaS pipeline

Adjacent industries with similar funnels

All Industries→

Send me your funnel by stage and conversion rate.

Plus your ICP description, top 3 acquisition channels, and last 3 months of net new MRR. I will reply within 24 hours with what is leaking, which channel deserves more budget, and what is missing from the engine. No sales call needed.

Send me the brief→ WhatsApp me directly