LeanData: Overcoming New Category Challenges to 8-Figures

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Evan Liang is the co-founder and CEO of LeanData, a platform that helps revenue teams manage all go-to-market motions.

In 2012, while at Caring.com, Evan faced significant challenges integrating their CRM and marketing automation systems. He built an internal solution to address the pain, which sparked the idea for LeanData.

So Evan decided to launch his startup.

He brought on a technical co-founder, Kelvin, and as a former VC, Evan was able to raise funding before they even had a product.

While raising money was relatively easy, finding product-market fit proved much more challenging.

As the solo salesperson, Evan signed LeanData's first 20 customers. But growth was painfully slow. LeanData struggled to educate prospects and close deals as a new category creator. Sales cycles often dragged on for up to three years.

If that wasn't bad enough, trhttps://saasclub.io/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/tools-and-materials-used-for-fashion-designing-4XD3MX3.jpgional marketing channels didn't work either. The founders had to get scrappy and creative. Finally, they found some success by attending events and meetups to connect with early adopters.

On top of that, Evan and Kelvin were under severe pressure from investors to grow faster. But Evan stuck to his guns. He had to balance the board's expectations with the harsh realities of creating a new category.

It wasn't easy, but Evan and his team kept at it. Today, LeanData serves over 1,000 customers, generates 8-figures in ARR, and has raised $42 million in funding.

This episode is part of our Enterprise Sales series.

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