Santi Magazu, CEO of OrbitalAds talks about how they got their first 12 customers (with a ticket size of around $25K ) by reaching out to targeted leads on LinkedIn. We also talk about their SDR outreach process, conversion funnel & how he intends to grow the company going forward.
So out of the 12 customers that you've sort of got, uh, sort
Upendra Varma:of, uh, managed to close so far, like where, where, which one was the, was
Upendra Varma:the most responsible channel for you?
Santi Magazu:The most responsible channel so far, uh, has been, I'm
Santi Magazu:thinking, I'm thinking because it changed over time, but, uh, so far
Santi Magazu:has been link in probably Link in
Upendra Varma:link.
Upendra Varma:How, how many customers did you sort of get from LinkedIn as such?
Santi Magazu:I think we, we got over 50%
Upendra Varma:for liquid.
Upendra Varma:Hello everyone.
Upendra Varma:Welcome to the Previ SA podcast.
Upendra Varma:Today we have Santi Mugga with us San uh, Santi here runs a
Upendra Varma:company called Orbital Ads.
Upendra Varma:Hey Santi, welcome to the show.
Santi Magazu:Thank you much for, uh,
Upendra Varma:having me.
Upendra Varma:Alright, Sandy, let's get started and let's try to understand what your
Upendra Varma:product does and why, uh, customers pay
Santi Magazu:you money.
Santi Magazu:It's very simple.
Santi Magazu:We help, uh, manage, uh, uh, pay search campaigns in Google Ads.
Santi Magazu:So basically, if you use Google Ads to get leads, to get awareness, We have a
Santi Magazu:very simple way, it's a SaaS service.
Santi Magazu:So we connect to your Google Ads account and you basically define the rules.
Santi Magazu:So let's say, let's say that you want to optimize your CCP C or have
Santi Magazu:a target cost per lead or a CPA, or return on advertising spend.
Santi Magazu:So you define the rule A.
Santi Magazu:We automatically connect to your Google accounts and we process all the
Santi Magazu:data from your Google search report.
Santi Magazu:We can also import data from third party.
Santi Magazu:Samera Citrix, um, or uh, similar web for keyword research and we are automatically.
Santi Magazu:Identify keywords you need to add your to your account or you need to ize or
Santi Magazu:you need to move from another to another.
Santi Magazu:We use a natural language processing to do that, and what we do is
Santi Magazu:basically we improve performance by about 15 to up to 20%.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:Of your campaigns, eh, end.
Santi Magazu:Top of that.
Santi Magazu:We save time to the tip because you don't need to do this
Santi Magazu:manually or do scripts to do.
Upendra Varma:So I wanna understand who your customers are and who you're trying
Upendra Varma:to sell this particular product to.
Upendra Varma:So can you, uh, so how many paying customers do you have
Upendra Varma:on your platform as of today?
Upendra Varma:We have
Santi Magazu:10 right now.
Upendra Varma:10.
Upendra Varma:And who are these customers?
Upendra Varma:What exactly do
Santi Magazu:they do there?
Santi Magazu:There are three types of customers.
Santi Magazu:There are.
Santi Magazu:Advertising agencies, which run campaigns for their clients.
Santi Magazu:So very large, uh, clients, uh, utility telcos, insurance, you name that.
Santi Magazu:That's the first time is, is advertising agencies.
Santi Magazu:They do this because they can deliver better service and
Santi Magazu:they save time the second time.
Santi Magazu:Are companies who manage advertising campaigns internally.
Santi Magazu:So they have an internal team doing this.
Santi Magazu:So they're looking for tools for the same reasons.
Santi Magazu:And third is a new segment we identify are what we call lead generation agencies.
Santi Magazu:So these are people who generate leads and that they sell the qualified lead to
Santi Magazu:utilities, insurances, telco, et cetera.
Upendra Varma:Got it.
Upendra Varma:And approximately how much revenue were you doing across all of these
Santi Magazu:customers last.
Santi Magazu:The, the average ticket is in the range of, uh, 15 to 2000, uh, dollars per month.
Santi Magazu:Sorry, 1500 to $2,000 per month.
Santi Magazu:That's, that's
Upendra Varma:the average, correct.
Upendra Varma:$25,000 annual contract value.
Upendra Varma:Something on, on that.
Upendra Varma:Yeah.
Upendra Varma:And that's the range.
Upendra Varma:Yeah.
Upendra Varma:And when did you get the first customer
Santi Magazu:on your platform?
Santi Magazu:We got the first SaaS customer in, uh, October, 2020.
Santi Magazu:So exactly two years ago.
Santi Magazu:That was the first one.
Santi Magazu:But to be frank, the product was sort of, Mvp, minimum viable product is
Santi Magazu:not the full product we have now.
Santi Magazu:So we spent the first 12 months basically adjusting the product through
Santi Magazu:the needs, and we really started selling, uh, beginning of this year.
Santi Magazu:Beginning of this year, this is when we really started selling.
Upendra Varma:Got it.
Upendra Varma:So it's, it's been approximately a year or so, right?
Upendra Varma:Something like that.
Upendra Varma:Yeah.
Santi Magazu:It's been about one year to find you the draw that we've been
Santi Magazu:in business for, for about 12 maps.
Upendra Varma:Right.
Upendra Varma:So since you got your Tenal customers, right.
Upendra Varma:So I, I'm assuming you know everything about this customer.
Upendra Varma:So talk to me about the process.
Upendra Varma:Right.
Upendra Varma:Where did they find you?
Upendra Varma:Right.
Upendra Varma:How did that type of funnel look like for you?
Upendra Varma:Were you running Google ads on your platform itself, or
Upendra Varma:how did it work out for you
Santi Magazu:so far?
Santi Magazu:So we don't use Google ads a lot to, to be frank, because
Santi Magazu:we go to a very niche segment.
Santi Magazu:This has have to be people who manage complex campaigns.
Santi Magazu:Cause if you have simple campaigns, you do need, uh, so, uh, which have a
Santi Magazu:significant investment in Google ads.
Santi Magazu:So they spend a lot.
Santi Magazu:and they have complex mix.
Santi Magazu:For instance, people who, uh, do campaigns in different languages because
Santi Magazu:our platform is language agnostic, so you can run campaigns in, in different
Santi Magazu:languages, even not speaking the language.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:, which is cool.
Santi Magazu:Uh, so it's a very difficult to, uh, to do a Google Ads
Santi Magazu:campaigns and target these people.
Santi Magazu:Yes.
Santi Magazu:Uh, so we use more Lincoln.
Santi Magazu:, you can do very specific audiences, and we do a lot of, uh, outbound,
Santi Magazu:uh, sales, uh, SDR reach.
Santi Magazu:So we really target people and we drive to them.
Santi Magazu:We call them every focus.
Santi Magazu:We have a very niche audience.
Santi Magazu:So, so
Upendra Varma:just, just help me quantify this, right?
Upendra Varma:So when you say outbound, why are your SDRs, what channel are you
Upendra Varma:primarily using and what is that particular niche that you're target?
Santi Magazu:So, uh, let me give you some numbers around this.
Santi Magazu:So we target ca clients in Europe, uh, north and South America,
Santi Magazu:and India for some reasons.
Santi Magazu:India is, is a very good market for this.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:, as you may know.
Santi Magazu:So we, uh, reckon to have about 12,000 customers.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:, target customers.
Santi Magazu:There are 12,000 companies right now who can buy our service.
Santi Magazu:So we can go very, very.
Santi Magazu:Micro segmenting.
Santi Magazu:So we look, uh, advertising agency India and there are not more than I no
Santi Magazu:1,500, which are really interesting.
Santi Magazu:So we go very precise on that.
Santi Magazu:On big A advertisers us there are maybe 500.
Upendra Varma:So how does the process look like once you
Upendra Varma:figure out this particular niche?
Upendra Varma:Right?
Upendra Varma:So are you doing outgoing emails or it, or is it outgoing calling
Upendra Varma:or some some magical strategy
Santi Magazu:that Yeah, we do a mix of that.
Santi Magazu:So first we tend to do, um, Emails first.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:, and depending on reaction, if they opened email, then we call.
Santi Magazu:So it's a mix of, uh, outbound emails and calling mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:. And we are, yeah, we are just starting to do a bit of inbound,
Santi Magazu:doing webinars, doing uh, specific content and how people reach out to us.
Santi Magazu:We had the webinar yesterday for this first time.
Santi Magazu:For same manager in the US we got 50 people, over 50 people joined
Santi Magazu:the webinar, which for us, our small company was, was a big success.
Santi Magazu:Got it.
Upendra Varma:So, so I want you to sort of quantify this in terms
Upendra Varma:of, you know, top of an elite generation perspective, right?
Upendra Varma:So you, you mentioned you use LinkedIn as well as outbound using page channels.
Upendra Varma:Right?
Upendra Varma:So out of the 12 customers that you've sort of got, uh, sort of, uh,
Upendra Varma:managed to close so far, like where, where, which one was the, was the
Upendra Varma:most responsible channel for you?
Santi Magazu:The most responsible channel so far, uh, has been, I'm
Santi Magazu:thinking, I'm thinking because it changed over time, but, uh, so far
Santi Magazu:has been link in probably Link in
Upendra Varma:link.
Upendra Varma:How, how many customers did you sort of get from LinkedIn as such?
Santi Magazu:I think we, we got over 50%
Upendra Varma:for liquid.
Upendra Varma:3%.
Upendra Varma:Got it.
Upendra Varma:And, and what's the strategy here?
Upendra Varma:Like were you trying to build a brand, brand using your personal account or
Upendra Varma:LinkedIn or was there something else that you were trying to do there?
Santi Magazu:Summertime, we use personal content.
Santi Magazu:I'm the c e o that is the founder is is not in the sector.
Santi Magazu:So we use a really, our network, although we use, um, a database.
Santi Magazu:So we t database, then we go very, we use some, uh, automation tools.
Santi Magazu:We, we use a capital automation tools for linking for that.
Santi Magazu:Uh, that's the, the main thing.
Santi Magazu:Essentially,
Upendra Varma:essentially it's like a cold outreach on LinkedIn
Upendra Varma:that you're doing, right?
Upendra Varma:Yeah.
Upendra Varma:Yeah.
Upendra Varma:So how does, yeah, so just help me complete the story here, right?
Upendra Varma:How does the conversion look like?
Upendra Varma:So how, how much converge acceptance rate do we get and how many of them do
Upendra Varma:actually end up expressing interest using
Santi Magazu:this channel?
Santi Magazu:I would say that it is about 10%, no, except maybe the range of 20%
Santi Magazu:sentence, uh, getting to have a, a significant, a relevant conversation.
Santi Magazu:Maybe out of hundred, maybe I would say four more in the regional.
Santi Magazu:Four or five.
Santi Magazu:Sure.
Santi Magazu:In one that, that's,
Upendra Varma:that's the range.
Upendra Varma:And it, and it's just going from your LinkedIn account.
Upendra Varma:Right?
Upendra Varma:Nothing else.
Santi Magazu:Well, this is one thing we do.
Santi Magazu:The LinkedIn tends to be the, the founder of myself, uh, and we tend to go to the
Santi Magazu:c e o to the vice, you know, to the CMO and to the C levels of the companies.
Santi Magazu:Yes.
Upendra Varma:Got it.
Upendra Varma:Right.
Upendra Varma:So since you're closing deals in the range of, you know, 2025 k a on a
Upendra Varma:regular basis, I'm assuming that you'll need to do a lot more than just, you
Upendra Varma:know, Showing them your potential customer, your, your product, right?
Upendra Varma:You've got to somehow convert that.
Upendra Varma:Talk about the conversion funnel, right?
Upendra Varma:So once you sort of, somehow, so
Santi Magazu:the, yeah, so the typical, I, I'll give you the typical thing.
Santi Magazu:So the typical thing is you have a first conversation, which is about
Santi Magazu:really understanding the pain points.
Santi Magazu:That's, that's a goal to understand what the pain point and if they
Santi Magazu:manage campaign campaigns internally or if there is an agency which you
Santi Magazu:need to involve in the process.
Santi Magazu:That's first thing.
Santi Magazu:. So the second thing, normally they come with their specific, uh, pain points and
Santi Magazu:say, okay, you told me about this, but my specific problem is the cost per lead.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:. And what we do is a demo on that specific issue.
Santi Magazu:So I bring in someone from our client success team, which is
Santi Magazu:a bit of a same specialist, and they do a monographic on that.
Santi Magazu:If there is an interest and they start saying, Hey, what's the price of this?
Santi Magazu:Then we say, look, let's do this.
Santi Magazu:Let's do a free.
Santi Magazu:let you, you use this for 30 days, obviously, if they qualify and at the
Santi Magazu:end of the 30 days, you know, we'll, we, we, we will, you, you can become,
Santi Magazu:and we are having a, a conversion rate.
Santi Magazu:I did this yesterday, so I can tell you it's about 16% from con initial
Santi Magazu:convers session to try and buy mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:And then, uh, the compression from, uh, tri by to paying customer.
Santi Magazu:Is between 60 and 70%.
Santi Magazu:I mean, good months is about 70% bad months 55.
Santi Magazu:So between 55 and 70% stay with us.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:, which is not bad.
Upendra Varma:Right.
Upendra Varma:So, so talk about the future, right?
Upendra Varma:How are you gonna scale up from let's two 50 K to something
Upendra Varma:like two 3 million, right?
Upendra Varma:What's the strategy going forward here?
Santi Magazu:So there is a product strategy, which is launching a new
Santi Magazu:product for small media businesses.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:small media accounts, which instead of being the range of.
Santi Magazu:1500 to $2,000 is going to be in the range of 50 to $500 per month.
Santi Magazu:That's a range.
Santi Magazu:That would be a simplified user interface is not only that you manage
Santi Magazu:less smaller campaigns, it's also that.
Santi Magazu:It's a simplified, less features, which is even better for some of these users.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:. So the first, uh, big thing is to go to a mid-market, which we don't serve today.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:. We have the product in beta where Connect, I hope, die by the end of the year.
Santi Magazu:This should be live.
Santi Magazu:. Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:, that's a big thing.
Santi Magazu:And then the next thing is to expand to, uh, Amazon advertising
Santi Magazu:and big manage of advertising.
Santi Magazu:So having under Network works and, uh, we're in the ra in
Santi Magazu:the, we are raising money now.
Santi Magazu:We we're going to do a new round of founding towards Q2 next year,
Santi Magazu:the second, uh, quarter next year.
Santi Magazu:And at that point we, I think we'll invest heavily in the marketing,
Santi Magazu:online marketing to get inbound, uh, traffic, which we don't get.
Upendra Varma:Got it.
Upendra Varma:Alright, so let's, let's conclude this, right?
Upendra Varma:So, so talk to me about the team that you have as of today.
Santi Magazu:So we have, we are, uh, 18 people.
Santi Magazu:Uh, half of this are developers and products, so half the
Santi Magazu:companies, developers a product.
Santi Magazu:Then we have, uh, uh, of the other eight.
Santi Magazu:Half is, uh, is selling.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:, uh, including myself and the founder.
Santi Magazu:We, we spend a lot of time with clients and half is, uh, client success.
Santi Magazu:So it's helping customers onboard and configure staff.
Santi Magazu:Got it.
Upendra Varma:And did you raise any external funding so far to
Santi Magazu:build the company?
Santi Magazu:Yes.
Santi Magazu:We raised, uh, since 2020, which was us, we raised, uh, 3 million euros so far.
Santi Magazu:Mm-hmm.
Santi Magazu:. Upendra Varma: Alright.
Santi Magazu:Thanks.
Santi Magazu:Thanks for taking the time to talk to me.
Santi Magazu:Hope you much greater heights.
Santi Magazu:Thank you.
Santi Magazu:It was a pleasure.
Santi Magazu:And thank you very much for reaching out to us.