The Scoop on SF Tech Week

San Francisco Tech Week just wrapped up, and wow, did the city come alive! 🌉

Tech minds converged, AC units worked overtime (because, yes, it was that hot 🌡️), and Ridge Ventures kindly let us take over their space to host not one, but two jam-packed panels on go-to-market strategies.

Now that we’ve cooled off and had time to reflect, we’re here to serve up the hottest insights from our events (pun intended).

🚀 Event 1: Lessons on Scaling from Founders

Our first event kicked off with the dream team of Kris Floyd from Darwinian Ventures, Mada Seghete from Upside, and Nishit Asnani from Sybill. They dished out some seriously good advice on scaling, so grab a pen—or better yet, your Notes app—and jot these down:

Technical Edge, FTW! 💻
Nishit revealed how Sybill’s founding team’s technical chops gave them a leg up in a crowded market. Skills, folks, skills!
Low-Tech, High Impact 📈
Kris reminded us all that you don’t need fancy tech for massive growth. Sometimes, the simplest marketing strategies make the biggest waves—just ask Tumble.
Community is Key 🤝
Mada took us to school on the power of community-building, drawing from her work at Branch and Upside. If you’re not creating a tribe around your brand, are you even growing?

🎯 Event 2: Lean GTM Strategies - Prepping for 2025

We started Tuesday with some locally brewed rocket fuel ☕ and a killer conversation on how to run a lean go-to-market operation. Byron Scott, Greg Parker, and Rashmi Viswanath had us rethinking everything from our tech stack to our sales strategies.

The highlights:

Less is More 🛠️
Cut down on tools—consolidate where you can. Why juggle five apps when Apollo can handle lead gen, email sequencing, and contact management all in one?
Break Those Data Silos 📊
Get all your data playing nice together for a full picture of what’s working. You’ll thank us when your attribution and reporting look chef’s kiss perfect.
Sales Plays Matter 🔄
Map out your sales tactics, and make sure your MQLs and SQLs are talking the same language. Versatile roles in your sales team? Yeah, that’s the future.

Bonus Round: Highlights from the Tech Week Tsunami

With over 600 events on the calendar, we couldn’t hit them all (we tried, promise!), but here are some other golden nuggets we picked up along the way:

Growth vs. Efficiency
Early-stage startups? Full steam ahead on growth. Later-stage companies? Pump the brakes and focus on efficiency.
Cash is King
Conserve cash like it’s 2020 again. Fundraising is tough out there, folks.
Automation is Coming for SDRs
Expect big changes for Sales Development Representatives, thanks to AI. If your SDR hasn’t befriended a bot yet, now’s the time.