How $1M Companies Make the Jump to $10M (Without Adding More Channels)

Most $1M teams donʼt stall for lack of leads; they stall because the system that got them to $1M doesnʼt compound. Before you spin up new channels, refactor how revenue gets created.

Four moves do most of the lifting from $1M to $10M.

Stay phone-first, but make every call start warm. Publish a one-screen proof page per ICP (one outcome metric, one before/after visual, 3-question intake, embedded 15–20-minute calendar) and route submits to a same-day callback SLA. Then sequence headcount the right way. Hire two AEs in parallel and get them to a consistent quota before bringing in a VP Sales. This gives you the pattern to coach, a comparable baseline, and removes single-rep bias.

At $1M, the fastest way to unlock the next jump is usually pricing, not more leads. Move to a Good–Better–Best structure with plainly separated benefits and outcomes. Review your pricing every 90 days, and keep the changes simple enough that your team and customers can follow them. Each time you review, change just one thing: either adjust how you charge for usage, set a clear minimum price, or add a paid “priority/speedˮ upgrade for faster service. Making one change at a time lets you see what actually moved results, and it keeps the whole process easy to explain.

Define what each sales stage means in plain terms and what must be true to move a deal forward. Hold one short weekly meeting to clean the pipeline: close stalled deals, confirm next steps, and name an owner for every open item. Track one simple view everyone uses (for example, wins and losses by customer type) and review it every week. Teams that fix habits first and add tools later grow faster because everyone works the same way. The real win is a steady rhythm your managers can keep running, not another dashboard.

Assume buyers will use a mix of self-serve and human help in the same deal. Give them a simple “start hereˮ page that shows proof and lets them book or try on their own. Then use calls for discovery and final decisions. Train reps to move smoothly between page, email, chat, and phone. Treat this hybrid path as the default way people buy now.

The leap to $10M is less about more noise and more about repeatability. Warmer calls, cleaner pricing, a disciplined sales rhythm, and a buying experience that matches how executives actually purchase. Nail those, and $10M becomes a waypoint.

Vanta sells automated security/compliance to technical and exec buyers. At the time of this writing, the company is at a meaningful scale with 12,000+ customers, and podcasts have become a visible pillar in how the brand shows up to that audience.

Vanta treated B2B podcasts as the core channel, where its buyers already hang out. The company began testing host-read ads in niche, operator-heavy shows years ago (internally described as “advertising in them since 2018,ˮ with public references to early tests in 2019). The aim was steady exposure in trusted rooms, so a 60–90 second read landed like a warm intro rather than an interruption.

By May 2022, the play leveled up from ads around programs to integrations inside them. At Acquiredʼs Climate Pledge Arena live show in Seattle, Vanta was billed as the presenting sponsor for Season 10, and the hosts brought Vantaʼs Head of Engineering, Matt Spitz, on stage for a live Q&A, an editorial-style segment that made the brand part of the show, not just a mid-roll. From there, Vanta kept its presence persistent and expanded its voice, telling the story. CEO Christina Cacioppo appeared in long-form interviews on podcasts like Masters of Scale, reinforcing the same narrative buyers were hearing in host reads and live integrations.

What made this tactically effective was the way the pieces fit together:

What changed while this strategy matured?

Public markers show the business moving sharply up and to the right in the same window. Vanta disclosed that it surpassed $100M ARR in the financial year ending January 2024. For Vanta, podcasts evolved from a test to a pillar, progressing from early host-reads to marquee presenting roles and executive storytelling, while the companyʼs revenue scale, valuation, and customer base climbed.

AI is the new front desk for buyers, and if your communication is consistent and your proof pages are easy to link, large models learn to pick you first. Your goal is to be the brand they can recognize and recommend without confusion. Here are a few things you can do to gain more visibility as search traffic moves from Google to ChatGPT.

Think of Dysonʼs tidy cordless lineup versus messy, overlapping series elsewhere. The simpler the system, the easier it is for models and buyers to match intent to your product

In the end, winners arenʼt louder; theyʼre clearer. They turn proof into momentum, price with intent, and show up where their buyers already are, week after week. The rest is discipline: a steady operating rhythm that converts interest into meetings and meetings into money. When a medium earns trust, double down.

If thereʼs a single test of maturity, itʼs repeatability. Ship the same quality of signal on Monday that you shipped last Monday, measure it, and do it again

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