Marketing Tech Businesses: A VC's view

Marketing tech businesses: a VC’s viewRob MoffatPirate Summit 2014

Invest $0.1M - $15M into tech companies

with $B potential

Invest across Europe, help businesses go

international

Have invested in >120 companies over

last 13 years2

ACQ.

$1B

IPO

$2BIPO$2B

ACQ.

$0.7B

Some of our team

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Me

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2000

2007

2009

Me

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VC view on marketing

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Retention ContributionMargin > CPAor

Spend €€€€before

working out:

VC view on marketing

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Rely only on SEM

VC view on marketing

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Do ‘black hat’ or ‘grey hat’ SEO

Stick to white hat:• Well structured site*• Quality, relevant content• Quality, relevant links

*As defined by Google

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Total customers

2,000 customers€17 CPA

Use blended CPAs€25 LTV business

New customers

Repeat customers

Paid channels

Free channels

Paid channels

Free channels

1600€20 CPA

Total customers

400€5 CPA

2,000 customers€17 CPA

800€35 CPA

100€35 CPA

800€5 CPA

300€4 CPA

Use blended CPAs€25 LTV business

VC view on marketing

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Ignore your brand

Not just name: what do you stand for?

Basic marketing value statement

<Your brand>is the

<what you do>that will

<benefit to your user>due to

<proof points>

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Do offline ads too early / without experience

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Put your faith in K-factor (referrals)

K = # of invites sent by each userx % conversion of each invite

Put your faith in K-factor (referrals)

Occasionally >1 for:• Games• Consumer apps• Developer tools

Usually 0.1 or less for: everything else

K = # of invites sent by each userx % conversion of each invite

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Spend time/effort getting into tech press

Helps for:• Hiring• Tech early adopters (sometimes)

Doesn’t help for:• Anything else

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Track hundreds of numbers before you know which are the 3-5 which really matter for you

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Lose people in the funnel(where this is in your control)

Lose people in the funnel(where this is in your control)

Which to focus on:20% drop out while choosing product

30% drop out when asked for credit card

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Depend only on A-B testing

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Use third party tools

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Have personality

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Be creative

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Be bold

Questions?

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[email protected]

@robmoff

www.robmoff.com