Securing initial customers as an early-stage startup remains one of the most grueling and formidable challenges in the entire business landscape. Even when young companies manage to generate initial interest, catch a wave of early buzz, or secure their first few paying clients, there is rarely any guarantee those customers will stick around for the long haul.
At TechCrunch Disrupt, startup leaders and venture capitalists converged to dissect this persistent hurdle. Elia Wallen, founder and CEO of travel startup Engine, Grant Lee, founder and CEO of presentation software creator Gamma, and Crystal Huang, a general partner at Google Ventures, took the stage to share hard-won insights on how to attract and retain customers in a rapidly shifting technological and cultural environment.
In the current startup era, young artificial intelligence companies frequently build massive audiences not just through their underlying software products, but also through the colorful, highly visible online presences of their founders. Social media can easily appear to be a magical, frictionless bullet for reaching early customers, driving sudden virality and overnight awareness. However, founders who want to meaningfully heighten their business strategy with modern digital marketing cannot rely on casual efforts; they have to be deeply strategic, according to Gamma’s Grant Lee.
Gamma, which sells advanced AI-powered presentation software, managed to scale its business exponentially by deploying a meticulously planned social media strategy. Rather than relying solely on corporate accounts, the company leveraged micro-influencers through its dedicated Ambassadors—or “Gambassador”—program. Gamma adopted this promotional plan long before influencer-based marketing became a tried-and-true, standard playbook for smaller tech companies. That early bet eventually helped propel the company to a multi-billion-dollar valuation, underscoring the potential power of creator-led ecosystems.
Yet, Lee cautioned that simply giving influencers a platform and telling them to promote a brand online does not automatically translate to sustainable sales or long-term growth. There is significantly more tactical execution required behind the scenes.
If a product is versatile enough to serve many different market segments or distinct use cases, founders need to engage creators who can authentically target each one of those specific niches, Lee explained during the panel discussion. For instance, a software product might appeal equally to external consultants and to corporate professionals who create all the slide decks for their chief marketing officers. Recognizing and addressing these diverse segments through the right creative voices is critical.
Lee observed that startup founders sometimes fall into the trap of treating creator marketing or influencer marketing as a set-it-and-forget-it mechanism. Instead, he argued that companies are much better served by investing substantial time and energy into working closely with these creators. If the influencers are unable to truly understand, internalize, and articulate the core value proposition of a product, it simply does not matter how much money a startup spends on the campaign—the initiative will ultimately fall flat.
Despite the modern allure of digital creators, the overall effectiveness of social media depends heavily on the specific type of business, target audience, and industry vertical. Traditional, offline ways of reaching customers can often prove to be just as effective, if not significantly more so, than viral online campaigns.
Elia Wallen understands this reality intimately. His company, Engine, which manages lodging and travel bookings for midsize businesses, bootstrapped its way to $150 million in total bookings before ever taking on any outside venture capital funding. During those foundational years, Engine operated with virtually no visible social media strategy at all. For Wallen, time-tested traditional sales tactics can be far more useful and reliable than a passing viral moment on platforms like TikTok.
Reflecting on those scrappy days, Wallen highlighted the value of direct human outreach. His team organized industry events, connected with prospects face-to-face, and engaged in what he described as smiling and dialing. Engine still employs teams that regularly pick up the phone to talk directly with prospective clients. Many people who did not grow up with that style of outreach, or who fail to understand modern outbound sales, mistakenly write it off as outdated or ineffective. However, Wallen insists that it works exceptionally well.
He noted that cold outreach and direct phone sales are undeniably hard work, leading many modern companies to simply refuse to do them or to lack the institutional knowledge to execute them well. In doing so, those businesses miss out on a massive, highly lucrative offline client base. The phone, Wallen emphasized, still works.
To illustrate the lengths to which a startup can go using offline, in-person engagement during its early days, Wallen shared a memorable anecdote. Engine once hired a professional magician named David to perform sleight-of-hand tricks for prospective clients at industry events, enticing them to visit Engine’s physical booth. For Wallen, this unconventional episode proved that old-fashioned personal engagement can work just as well, if not better, than the latest digital social media tricks.
Once a startup successfully clears the hurdle of acquiring its initial customers, the focus must immediately shift toward retention and deeply understanding user behavior. Crystal Huang, who has managed droves of early-stage startups and shepherded them toward long-term market success from her vantage point at Google Ventures, stressed that immense value can be derived simply by analyzing how active users interact with a product.
Founders should look closely into internal usage data to answer fundamental questions about the health of their user base, Huang advised. They need to determine whether product usage is recurring, whether consumption metrics are increasing over time, and whether existing users are naturally referring their friends and colleagues to the platform.
These positive signals often manifest clearly in early usage and customer retention information long before broader financial metrics catch up, according to Huang. Beyond quantitative data, founders should keep a sharp eye out for qualitative indicators of brand affinity, such as identifying enthusiastic super fans who express a desire to work for the company, actively promote the brand online, or become deeply attached to the corporate identity. Ultimately, startups need to develop deliberate ways to cultivate passionate evangelists who truly love the product.
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