TEST: Driving Enterprise Growth in a Niche Space

I’m currently an EVP of Marketing at QorusDocs. I’ve been working in marketing for the last 25 years, a mix of start ups, and a large part spent in channel marketing at Microsoft. These last five years, leading Marketing at QorusDocs. QorusDocs offers B2B AI driven proposal management software to companies that offer a lot of services to their customers (like legal, AEC, professional services, tech services, etc.) We are in a category that has been growing over the past few years, especially with the advent of GenAI. We sell primarily to large enterprises across multiple services focused verticals and strive to keep marketing high-performing and lean.

To me, marketing is about the customer. I love the psychology of the customer, which means you need to know them, understand their use cases and then deliver on those needs. Ultimately, it’s about keeping the customer’s needs and experience in mind in every interaction, while being genuine and transparent. For our marketing team, this is the foundation of everything we do. Marketing needs to be professional and polished, regardless of the budget I have (and marketing does require a budget!). Being a Type A personality, I can’t help it.
Then there’s the data part that I love—building out models that prove the value of marketing and the impact we have on our customers. Everything from funnel metrics to conversion to churn. From my Microsoft days, I’ve always compared options with expected ROI: If I had an additional budget, where would I put it? What would drive the best outcome? That’s the science part that I enjoy the most.

Making sure that we hit company growth goals is of utmost importance. We work with enterprise organizations, which often means longer and more complex deal cycles frequently starting through inbound channels. I’m often asking if we have enough in the machine to hit our numbers and if we can forecast what will close based on what’s currently in the pipeline? Once we establish our goals, we break them down into what channels deliver the right types of opportunities, and we build out strategies for each channel to make sure we can reach our goals. And we always leave a little room for the “fun” stuff and out-of-the-box thinking.

At the same time we also focus on the brand metrics, such as recognition, reputation growth, and analyst mentions that drive long-term trust.

Driving demand in a niche category requires balancing the budget between demand generation and brand awareness with a precise focus on our ICP. We experimented with widening the funnel but ultimately learned to focus on customers with high lifetime value and lower churn.

Some of our audiences can’t be reached via traditional SaaS methods – such as third-party review sites, google, LinkedIn, etc. They spend more time in community based forums and organizations (like law firms and professional services firms). In order to drive the volume of leads, we needed to be a part of these events and communities, building trust and recognition with thought leadership, sponsorships and participation. So hitting our pipeline goals in the short term and building out a long-term reputation with our ideal customer profile is what we have to balance daily.

We are a tight-knit group, combining an in-house team focused on marketing operations, content, and product marketing with a number of specialized contractors. We work with Dos Lados on PPC/SEO and our website. Combining an in-house team with unique specialization in specific functions has helped us achieve a high level of expertise and make the most of our budget. Our team is truly global, which is a huge advantage! We can work asynchronously, with some projects progressing in different time zones while the US is offline. Additionally, our team's diversity and cultural perspectives are invaluable.

If I had unlimited resources though, I’d always have the following roles on the team: data/ops specialist, product marketing, expert writer and content/event marketer, and social media and PR.

At Microsoft, I realized the value of external expertise. If the budget is limited I keep the key operational roles in house and hire experts for marketing initiatives that can be done as a fractional role. Also being a jack of all trades in marketing, I can fill the gaps if something needs to get done - even though I could do without writing a social post, or detailed event planning!

At this point in my career, I rely on my network and referrals from people I trust. I hardly ever put a job rec out to hire cold or work with agencies unless someone in my network recommends them. That’s my first green flag.

Another green flag is when I work with an agency and I can feel they love what they do. Of course they specialize in the area that I need, but then their passion for that subject stands out. They truly care about my business as much as I do.

And finally it’s the flexibility. The reality of high growth companies is that there are times when there are lots of projects and times when we have to cut and make budget decisions. An agency’s ability to expand hours to support additional projects, and being able to scale down, but still keeping the agency relationship going is a sign of a true partnership for me. I also make sure that I invest into that partnership by making introductions, connecting vendors and building stronger networks altogether.

I like when we work with people who can adjust/adapt, including agencies, and see beyond the immediate work to the bigger picture. Helping us to look forward and adapt and answer questions is really valuable. If this attitude and philosophy isn’t present, this is a red flag for me.

Another thing to look for with agencies is “Do they truly understand your business?”. Understanding the dynamic and the grit of the startup grind, so they know the B2B sales cycle and have had some real world experience in a fast moving marketing team. Limiting engagements to long term commitments upfront, without proven success, all raise red flags for me.

And finally the results - respecting or re-negotiating the time lines and providing quality of the deliverables is a value we hold, as well as asking “how it’s going” and checking in.

Ultimately, it’s a mix of professionalism, timely deliverables and clear ability to showcase the impact we are driving. The best thing is when the deliverable is better than the brief I sent!

With PR agencies, it’s changing a lot, but general marketing awareness and influence toward our goals is what I look for there. When it comes to digital strategies offered by companies like Dos Lados, it’s hard measures, like website health, paid advertising results, and punching above our belt in terms of visual quality of the website. What I also value is being able to strategize together when it comes to positioning the outcomes to different audiences - whether it’s leadership, board or other teams.