ACCEPTING EARLY APPLICATIONS: We just started taking applications for the Vibe Your SaaS Q1 2026 Startup Pitch Event at the AWS Builder Loft in SF.

If you’re a founder or investor, apply here to attend.

I still have a few sponsorship opportunities. Reply to this email if interested. VYS // IRL is going to be big in 2026, I can feel it.

Co-Founder and CEO: Stuart Brent
Location: Nashville
Stage: Seed
Website: Sassydb.com
Social: LinkedIn

Most lead databases nickel and dime you for individual contacts. One email. One credit. One more invoice. saasyDB breaks that model. Instead of selling single leads, it sells full company access.

SaasyDB focuses only on SaaS companies. No generic B2B noise. You search and filter by company size, funding stage, and growth signals. When you unlock a company, you get access to the entire employee list.

Outreach works better when you can approach a whole company like a system, not a lottery ticket. SaasyDB makes that practical and affordable. It favors persistence, relevance, and smarter targeting over volume spam.

*How to submit your startup.

This is a collection of modern holiday music from 2000 onward. Indie heartbreak, synthy glow, and a few pop heaters that actually hold up. No mall vibes, no novelty, just songs that feel like December.

I am heading to NYC for a few days to spend time with my father. I can’t wait. I love NYC so much, even though I have been on the West Coast for over 20 years, every time I go back, it still feels like home.

But that won’t stop me from being my usual self, pumping out lots of content, including this newsletter. It’s just what I do.

I hope you enjoy some time with your family this week.

Be a co-author? I love writing this newsletter, but the co-author program resulted in some great work. If you think you have what it takes, reply to this email.

Founders and CXOs get trapped in this unforgiving loop. You ship, you post, you run a campaign, you watch the graph. If the line does not go up and to the right fast enough, everyone assumes marketing is not working.

But in startups, the earliest proof is not a dashboard. It is behavior. It is the speed at which buyers move from curiosity to specificity. It is how often your name shows up in rooms you are not in.

Here are ten signals you are building real demand.

Your DMs stop sounding like, “What do you do?” and start sounding like, “We have this problem, can you help?”

People reference a feature, use case, constraint, or timeline. That is the start of a buying process, not a content interaction.

When marketing is working, prospects arrive pre-educated. They already understand the category, believe their pain matters, and want to know whether you are the right solution.

Sales stops re-teaching the basics and starts qualifying and closing.

More people type your company name, product name, or founder name into a search. That matters because it reflects intent and recall, not passive reach. If your brand is sought out, you are building mindshare.

It took about 6 months to appear, but "Vibe Your SaaS" is now the most-searched term on Google, driving traffic to my site.

Lead quality improves. Fewer random demos. More stakeholders. More budget fit. More urgency. You might not have twice as many leads yet, but the ones you have feel real.

The tire kickers and people who want to pick your brain will fall away when you start to look like an established brand.

The comments you get change. Instead of “great post,” you will start to get “we are seeing this too,” followed by details. Buyers do not share details unless they believe you can help.

And if your competitors show up in the replies, you’re crushing it.

The slow part of startup selling is the first 30%. When marketing works, that part shrinks. Prospects move from first touch to real conversation faster because trust is being built before the call.

The first few sales will need a lot to get confidence. But by 25, it will feel like a well-oiled machine as you’re now prepared for every question they ask.

One time I asked sales what they wanted from markeitng, and they told, “They want the prospect to know who they are before they walk into the room.”

When you get fewer skeptical openings like “so tell me what you do.” You hear, “I have been following you,” or “I read that thing you wrote about.” You know marketing is doing its job of creating familiarity so sales can do their job.

Saves, forwards, and internal shares are stronger signals than likes. It means your content is being used in decision-making. Someone is sending it to a co-founder, a VP, a CFO, or a board member with, “This is what I mean.”

This is hard to measure, but many PDFs are forwarded, which is a good reason to invest in creating downloadable content.

You will hear your language echoed back in calls, see your framing in someone else’s deck, or notice competitors adopting your category definition.

It is annoying. It is also proof that you are shaping the narrative.

Good partners do not chase random brands. They chase leverage. When your positioning is clear, integrations, channels, co-marketing, and ecosystem players start reaching out because you are becoming an obvious node in the market.

The quality of inbound is a strong indicator of your brand health.

If you see three or more of these, your marketing is working. Do not panic and pivot. Your job is to tighten the loop. Keep the message consistent, keep the proof points coming, and let the compounding do its thing.

Keep in mind that, unless you’re doing PLG at a huge scale, most B2B products never get enough signal to quantifiably ‘prove’ anything is working. You need to look at the signals you have and make the right choice.

If you see none of this after three to six months, doing more will not save you. Refocus on one ICP, one sharp pain, and one point of view you can own. Then repeat it until it feels boring.

Boring is when it just starts to register in the market.

On The Gregory and Paul Show, we break down the latest in startups, SaaS, AI, and whatever the internet is debating this week.

🎙️ Episode 027 – With Special Guest Arjun Dev Arora

Arjun is back for a wide-ranging conversation on founder origin stories, bootstrapping versus raising capital, what 500 Startups got right about portfolio math, the traits that actually predict founder success, and the practical realities of fundraising in 2026. The crew also riffs on space tech and orbital data centers, the Lovable funding headline, self-driving trucks versus labor, and the race for an Anthropic or OpenAI IPO that could unlock a new wave of liquidity across startups.

I'm a former creative director, 3x head of marketing, and founder of Vibe Your SaaS. After 20 years in Silicon Valley, devising new ways to get people to click on things, I now help early-stage B2B SaaS companies scale their businesses through strategic sales and marketing consulting.

Some VYS clients have grown 3x, 5x, 8x, and even 24x while working with me. No, really, one VYS customer grew revenue by an incredible 24x.

Have questions? Want to learn more about working together? Reply to this email. I write everyone back, it’s true. Ask around.

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