Lessons hitting $1M ARR again
I recently hit the almighty $1M ARR milestone as co-founder at GrowthPair—and since I wrote about this milestone during my last startup journey, I figured I’d share what it feels like the second time around.
Starting with founder-market fit
Here are a few raw emotions and thoughts that come to mind:
Just as sweet
Just as validating
Feels like a cheat code
I never truly understood the importance of “founder-market fit” until building this startup and hitting $1M ARR just six months after bringing on customers. When I say scaling this company feels like a cheat code, I genuinely believe it’s because of that fit.
So how do you know if you’ve found founder-market fit for your startup? Ask yourself these three questions:
Are you passionate about the idea?
Do your experiences align with the idea?
Does your skillet align with the idea?
Here’s how I’d answer these in the context of GrowthPair:
I love the growth space and being a “professional matchmaker” between top global marketers and companies.
Yes, I recently built and sold a very similar global staffing company.
Yes, I’ve been in growth marketing for the last 15 years.
That’s a perfect match, if you ask me.
I'd argue that the first two questions are the most important because the third can be self-taught. But having all three is a golden key to achieving some pretty amazing results.
Why it felt so much easier
With Roland Garros playing in the background, I’ve been reflecting on why it felt so much easier to hit $1M ARR this time.
If you asked Novak Djokovic whether his second Grand Slam was easier than his first, I’m sure he’d say yes. He learned how to prepare, what to do, and what not to do.
That’s exactly how I approached my second time around, armed with experience and a clear sense of direction:
Distribution over everything
Before bringing on any customers, I spent a few months building a reputable squad of partners and advisors with strong audiences who could help spread the word. These were handpicked folks who believed in the GrowthPair mission, had stellar reputations in the growth space, and had access to the kinds of customers we wanted to serve.
Being picky is okay
At my last startup, we said yes to every customer who walked through the door—a big mistake.
Yes, in the early stages you should work with different types of customers to learn and refine your ICP. But once you’ve done that, it’s okay to get picky. It might hurt to leave money on the table, but it’s far more painful to work with the wrong customers.
I’d say $250K ARR is a good point to start being more selective and focus only on those you can serve best.
Building a tech stack for scale
I had the advantage of knowing exactly what tools to use from my previous startup, but here’s my advice: don’t skimp on tools.
Instead of saving $100/year on a cheaper option, invest in the one that will scale with you. Switching later is more expensive, especially in terms of team retraining and migration headaches.
Pro tip: Research what tech stack your direct competitors are using. This is often public info or you can even interview a former employee (yes, even with cash).
ICP of 1 does wonders
My co-founder, Alex Lieberman, introduced me to this early on. He asked for one simple thing:
“Send me the LinkedIn profile of your ideal customer.”
This forced me to get hyper-specific—job title, company size, industry, etc. That exercise laser-focused me on CMOs at companies with $1M+ in annual revenue.
That’s the segment we support better than anyone else because everything we do is built for them.
Continue talking to customers
The biggest mistake I made in my last startup was detaching from customer conversations and handing them off to sales and customer success.
I thought I was freeing myself up to focus on “higher-priority” tasks. I was wrong. Talking to customers is the highest priority task.
No matter if we’re at $1M or $25M, I pledge to keep taking sales and customer calls so I stay close to the heartbeat of the business.
If this helps even one founder avoid the mistakes I made, share it out to them. And yes, I’ll be back with more lessons as I collect them.