Private Equity Funcast Exit-Ready Marketing: Shiv Narayanan on Making Marketing Measurable in PE-Backed Companies
Jun 10, 2025
Shiv Narayanan, founder of How to SaaS and author of Exit-Ready Marketing, shares his expertise on optimizing marketing for private equity-backed companies. He highlights the critical role of measurable marketing strategies in driving business value, emphasizing the need for better alignment with PE priorities. Shiv discusses common marketing pitfalls, effective data-driven practices, and the importance of clear communication with boards. Tune in for insights on creating a marketing function that truly propels growth.
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Marketing Immaturity Is Universal
- Many mid-market software companies have immature marketing despite revenue size, and patterns repeat across firms.
- Shiv Narayanan turned repeated engagement learnings into a simplified, repeatable framework for PE-backed marketing transformation.
Diligence: Ask Three Revenue Questions
- In diligence, answer three questions: how predictable is revenue, what must each function do, and what marketing role and budget are required.
- Build pipeline needs by channel to size spend and team for post-close value creation.
Bring Channel-Level Economics
- Prepare channel-level spend, pipeline, conversions, CAC and payback for diligence.
- Identify inefficient channels to reallocate budget and test net-new opportunities with small experiments.
