Mitchell Keller

I'm actively building the most efficient system to go from product market fit to message market fit using outbound and inbound led outbound and I'm having a blast doing it. Basically my team will find the people you want to contact no matter how hard they are to find, and ideally ones that have a clear publicly available issue to pray o- i mean help them with. hahaha. 

It's simple, empower sales teams with top of funnel that drives revenue, acquisition value and fatter fundraising rounds. 

Here's some case studies: From Rought US market entry to 2m in popeline in 40 days:https://gamma.app/docs/From-Market-Entry-to-2M-Pipeline-How-LeadGrowai-Transformed-a-Top-gp4lui8pe6n30v4?mode=doc 

https://gamma.app/docs/From-1-meeting-a-quarter-to-320K-in-closed-revenue-12m-in-pending-j3zinck91npcgmv

Some more sweet stuff on my youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@MitchellKeller_ 

If you believe your sales team should spend more time crushing and less time data crunching then send me a message. 

P.S. We tend to work with extremely high ticket companies, companies with tiny hard to find markets and seed to series A funded looking to take their product market fit and find an assymetry that scales it to the moon.

Co-Founder

Our Solutions  *Ask about our work for free performance guarantee ⚡️

✅ Organic Social: We drive quality traffic to your social channels, to generate exponential awareness to your brand, so you can draw in further investments, partners & have the community base for successful IDOs & INOs.

✅ Paid Social Advertising: We create grandslam offers & dynamic engagement-focused design to structure powerful campaigns that generate leads & increase conversions. 

✅ Web3 Consultations: We leverage our 60+ IDO's of experience to provide you endless value.


✅ Website Design & Copy: We research your brand & its competitors to generate compelling copywriting & design that is purpose-built to create the best customer journey possible. Through this we turn web traffic into valuable leads & conversions for you to increase ROI. 

✅ NFT Art: We conceptualize & create world-class 2D & 3D art that enhances your brand’s value to Web3 consumers & turn them into loyal fans that will buy your NFTs, while you sit back & focus on refining your business & utilities. 

✅ Pitch Deck Design & Copy: We do all the market research, copywriting & design for your pitch deck to be concise and tell your value story in a straightforward manner, so you can raise money effectively.


✅ Brand Design & Copy: We identify your brand voice & create value-focused copy that is empowered by dynamic design. Helping you connect with your target customer more deeply & generate lifetime value. 


✅ Video Production: We create premium 2d & 3d narrated promotional videos that provide a fantastic first impression of your business. Turning profile views into active followers for you. 

✅ Community Management: We manage & encourage participation in events to cultivate loyal communities. By gamifying user experiences we are able to provide daily value to community members & generate authentic discussions to turn members into fans. All of which creates the perfect community for you to sell anything too.

the job of a GTM engineer isnt building lists

it isn't research

it isn't consolidating data, sending messages, writing offers.

it's finding a single thread.

a thread that when pulled on unravels markets and unmasks opportunities.

the job of a GTM engineer is to use any tools necessary to find this thread, that is all.

if you knew exactly what to say to your market, how many deals would you close? ⊚ Turn strangers into customers with Stealth Offers 👉 the ones your competitors didn’t even think were possible.

My entire GTM tech stack (and what each tool does):

Building a GTM engine that doesn't require a 10-person ops team + helps you stop wasting money on Clay Credits. 

Here's what powers it:

List Sourcing

- Apollo → Company list building (love filtering by job titles on team)
- AI Ark → AI-powered prospecting
- DiscoLike → Lookalike audiences & list expansion
- GTME. business → Disgustingly + cheapest good local lead scraping (Gmaps)
- Followingg.co → Competitor/partner follower scraping (gauges company maturity)
- Crunchbase → SaaS/investor data for enterprise targeting
- ScrapeCreators → Social scraping
- TopYappers → Influencer data (tiktok + IG)
- LeadsonTrees → Daily Newly funded startups fully enriched.
- CCLeads → coaches and creator biz's

Research & Intelligence

- Serper → Google Search API for Maps, News, general data (~$50/mo vs $500+ traditional)
- Custom RSS feeds (Serper + Google News) → Funding alerts, competitor monitoring
- Spider. Cloud → Web scraping at scale
- Apify, Scrapingdog, RapidAPI → Various scraping for cheap (including the business network ;))
- Job post monitoring → Competitor hiring signals
- TheirStack → historical technology data from sites and job posts

Lead Enrichment (Waterfall System)

- Icypeas → TryKitt.ai → LeadMagic
~$0.005-0.01/email vs $0.50+ on ZoomInfo
- BlitzAPI → LinkedIn enrichment (trialing - extremely promising)

Phone data: Leadmagic + clay waterfall

List Hygiene & Deliverability

- EmailGuard → Spam checking, placement tests, Surble checks
- In-house MX checker → Security gateway detection
- In-house list batching → Send cadence optimization
Outreach

- EmailBison → Campaigns, sequences, best in class deliverability
- Raw Claude+claudecode + custom skill → Copy generation

Sales & Conversion

- Fireflies.ai → Meeting transcription, summaries, content fuel
- Gamma → AI-generated proposals & custom client resources
- Tella→ Personalized VSLs & 1:1 video outreach
Content & Distribution
- Any CRM tbh. 

Knowledge & Client Management

GitHub + Git worktrees → Client knowledge bases in markdown
Fireflies.ai → Feeds content creation + improves knowledge base over time
Google Workspace → Deliverables
GitBook → Client-facing knowledge sharing


Raw Infrastructure

- Supabase → Database backend
- OpenRouter → LLM API routing (pay per token, not per seat)
- Trigger.dev → Background jobs & automation
n8n → Workflow automation (self-hosted = $0)
- Trigify.io → socail data -> Slowly replacing with in-house solutions
- Brightdata → Disgustingly good proxies and data unblockers
- Snowflake → Tons of free bulk data


The glue: Claude Code and Clay
Skills (SOPs as code) tie everything together. One command can:

- Conduct research
- Qualify companies, format data
- Programmatically search Supabase to pull leads
- Spintax and spam check copy iteratively.

Whereas Clay has extreme concurrency, and useful tools built in. 

The individual tools are commodities. The orchestration layer is the multiplier.

Study any Alex Hormozi funnel.

Top to bottom, nuts to bolts.

They're ALL "bet on you" offers.

Here's what I mean:

Most offers make prospects bet on YOU.
"Trust us. We're good. Here's our case studies."

The best offers make prospects bet on THEMSELVES as well.

The difference is subtle but massive.

Here's an example:

Generic: "We'll help you implement AI agents"

Bet on you: "You already hired a head of AI strategy. He probably has coherent thoughts on how your business should implement AI. We're just the way to get from idea to production."

See the shift?

The second version:
- References an investment THEY already made
- Validates a decision THEY already committed to
- Makes success feel like a natural extension of their judgment

The prospect thinks: "Yeah, I DID hire that person. They DO have ideas. This makes sense."

Belief goes up cause they're not betting on a stranger.
They're betting on a decision they already believe in.

How to find your "bet on you" angle:

1. What has this prospect already invested in? (Hiring, tech, strategy)
2. What do they already believe? (Their thesis, their approach)
3. How does your offer validate and extend that belief?

When you nail this, one-call closes become normal.

Cause you're not selling anymore.

You're just validating what they already want to believe.

Video breaking down Alex's bet on your offers coming soon.

We start every client on cold email.

Not LinkedIn DMs.
Not cold calls.
Not ads.

Cold email first. Always.

Here's why.

The problem:

LinkedIn has reputation risk. If you test bad messaging on LinkedIn, your personal brand takes the hit. Your connections see it. Your prospects remember it. There's no reset button.

Cold email is anonymous. You can test 10 different positioning angles in a week. The ones that fail disappear. The ones that work become your foundation.

What makes it worse:

Most teams test messaging on the channel that matters most. They run experiments on LinkedIn—where their CEO's face is attached to every message.

Then they wonder why sales feels risky.

The fix:

Use cold email as your messaging lab.

People are painfully honest in email replies. They'll tell you to F off if they don't like your angle. That honesty is data. It tells you exactly what your market thinks.

Once you find what works—the situations that resonate, the language that lands—you graduate to LinkedIn with confidence.

But here's the thing: LinkedIn is a complement, not a replacement.

More people have email addresses than LinkedIn profiles. You can reach your entire market faster through email. And you're not outsourcing your thinking to a black box like ads—you know exactly who replied and what they said.

Plus, LinkedIn has friction email doesn't.

On average, only 40% of people accept connection requests. That means 60% of your outreach never even lands. And without content backing up your profile, LinkedIn doesn't convert as well anyway.

The sequence that works:

1. Test messaging on cold email (low risk, precise targeting, fast learning)
2. Find the positioning that resonates
3. Scale through LinkedIn with proven language + content

Stop testing on channels where failure has consequences.

Start where failure is free.

Well this is giving me the warm fuzzies

Got a DM from someone saying they've been enjoying my content. 

Really reassuring cause it's easy to think what you know is too simple to share. You prob have way more value to give than you think.

No alternative text description for this image

Employee count is lazy targeting.

Here's a better signal:

maturity.

We were figuring out how to segment a market of PE firms recently.

The obvious move: big firms vs small firms.

The better move: look at the makeup of their team.

Do they have someone with "AI" or "automation" in their title?
Have they hired for technical roles recently?
Is there evidence of data infrastructure investment?

Why this matters:

A 200-person company with zero technical talent is harder to sell AI to than a 20-person firm with a head of AI strategy.

Size tells you scale.
Maturity tells you readiness.

When you segment by maturity:
- You can make technical arguments to technical buyers
- You skip the education phase
- Close rates go up cause they already believe AI works

When you segment by size alone:
- You waste time explaining basics
- You get stuck in "we're not ready" objections
- Pipeline feels full but nothing closes

The signal hierarchy:

1. Do they have technical leadership? (AI lead, automation role, data team)
2. Have they made related investments? (AI tools in their stack, recent tech hires)
3. What's their public stance on AI? (Content, job postings, press)

Size is the last filter. Not the first.

This is how you stop getting stuck in education-mode sales calls.

Target readiness. Not revenue.

Looking for head of GTM

Must be excited about building outbound strategies and copy that generate companies 100's of thousands from outbound and get founders acquired.

You will be my right hand man on strategy and copy and help lead a GTM team

This role is for you if:
- You're a former/tired agency owner that doesn't wanna close deals.
- And/or you come from a high level sales background.
- And/or you come from a growth background.

+ Are competitive as hell and like me (somewhat austically) tend to pursue excellence to a fault.

Technical acumin welcome.

Competitive base + disgusting revshare available.

interested?

🚨Send a DM outlining why you're right for the job and a specific example of executing a top of funnel campaign from strategy to end outcome🚨

Other keys to role:

- elite communicator
- systems thinker (can make a coherent plan and see it through to the end)
- disturbingly comprehensive understanding of gtm tools (see my post on gtm tools)

ie: clay, apollo, instantly, heyreach, Claude code/cursor, sales NAV, apify.

Intent signals are useful.

Pricing page visits. G2 reviews. Job postings.

But they're not how you test your offer.

Here's the problem most people miss:

The math:

- 3% of your market is actively looking (signals)
- what about the rest?
If you're testing your offer based on signals only, you're testing it on 3% of the market.

That's too slow.

Here's what happens:

You send 1,000 emails to signal-triggered leads.
You get 50 replies.
You book 10 calls.
3 close.

What now?

Now you think you know if your offer works and you're out of leads. 

But it doesn't.

You know if your offer works on the 3% who were already looking.

That's not the same thing.

Here's the thing:

Signals don't test the meat and bones of your offer.

They test your ability to catch people at the right moment.

That's valuable. But it's not product-market fit.

The real test is the people that would buy but don't know it yet. 

People who are in a situation to buy but haven't announced it to the world -> the situations beyond the signals.

- Series A -> no CMO (could extend runway by months with the right hire)
- Ripping ads but no newsletter + fat sales team (leaving hella food on the table)
- Team growing fast (process breaking, need help)

These people will tell you if your offer actually resonates.

Cause they're not already shopping.

They're being interrupted. Shown a new way. 

If you can make them stop and pay attention, your offer is real.

Signals are complementary.

Run them for quick wins and pipeline padding.

But don't confuse high conversion on signal campaigns with a validated offer.

That's just good timing.

Strategically test outside of signals. 

That's where you learn your winning offer the one that unlocks the rest of your gtm strategy.

Best performing campaign we're running right now:

40% positive reply rate.

The source: SAM(.)gov (government contract awards).

Here's the play:

When a company wins a government contract, they get paid... eventually.
Government payment terms are notoriously slow.
30, 60, 90 days.

Meanwhile, they need capital to deliver on the work.

The signal: Contract won.
The situation: Cash flow gap.
The offer: Capital against the invoice.

Why this works so well:

1. **Timing is perfect**

They just won. They're excited.
But reality is about to hit: they need to fund the work before they get paid.

2. **Relevance is obvious**

"Congrats on the $X contract. Need capital to bridge the gap?"

That's not a pitch. That's a genuine question.

3. **Qualification is built-in**

Government contracts are vetted.
These are real businesses with real revenue.
No tire-kickers.

The tradeoff:

Volume is limited.
Only so many contracts get awarded weekly.

That's why signals aren't always the best strategy.
They're high-converting but volume-constrained.

The lesson:

Find your SAM(.)gov equivalent.

What public event signals genuine, immediate need?
That's your 40% reply rate campaign waiting to be built.

Low volume. High conversion.
That's the signal play.

But keep in mind this is just a drop in the bucket. it's got the best stats but not the best outcome. 

10x volume at a 12% PR is still the biggest winner.

Once you have an offer that's working what's next? 

How do you make it transcendent. How do you make it so lethal it turns strangers into customers on autopilot. 

Here's a breakdown on what I call building worldview alignment into offers until they become that holy grail Stealth Offer. 

An offer so good that it must be uncovered not created. Mined out of the very market itself.

Lending is a 'crowded market.'

Everyone offers rates. Terms. Speed.

When there's a crowd it's your positioning that matters most. You don't wanna be Waldo you wanna be the blacksheep in an ocean of white. 

Here's a positioning angle most miss:

Rescue.

We were working on positioning for a revenue-based financing company's repackaging service.

The obvious frame: "We offer better rates than your current loan."

The better frame: "Loan rescue."

"This guy was drowning. We came in with a capital rescue. Repackaged his debt. Now he can breathe."

Same service. Completely different story.

Why "rescue" works:

1. It implies urgency without creating it
2. It positions you as the hero, not just another option
3. It speaks to emotional state, not just financial state

Most people with bad loans don't think "I need better rates."
They think "I'm stuck."

"Rescue" meets them where they actually are.

How to find your rescue angle:

Look at repackaging case studies.

Not the numbers. The narrative.

- What was the emotional state before?
- What changed after?
- What would have happened without intervention?

The story writes itself.

"She took an MCA that felt manageable. 6 months later, she couldn't make payroll. We restructured. She made payroll. Now she's expanding."

That's not "better rates."
That's rescue.

Position the transformation, not the transaction.

Most lenders sound the same cause they sell the same.

Rescue positioning makes you the only option that feels like relief.

100% 1-1 AI emails are a fools errand for any company that is pre offer-market fit.

you're outsourcing your distribution to a black box and making it 20x more difficult to discern what's working and what isn't.

you'll be lucky to stumble on a true outlier doing this.

this is for after you find your offer.

You launched an AI SDR. One-of-one campaign. Booking a few meetings.

Crushing it. Happy.

But you have no idea why it works.

You let AI take over from day one. Outsourced your figure-it-out phase to a black box.

Campaign performs? Great. Now scale it.

You can't. Because you don't actually know what's working. Was it the targeting? The angle? The timing? The AI won't tell you.

The founders who win learn the game first. Then automate.

🚨tHiS uLtiMaTe GeMiNi 3.o MeThOd BrInGs RaInWaTeR tO tHe SaHaRa

this system unlocks 300,000 square km of viable land mass that everyone else has overlooked but after 36 hours of studying the back of my hand im giving it away.

this system will:

- extract unblooded diamonds 
- automatically send a dollar a day to that local infomercial village
- solve how tf they got the 400 ton stone up the Nile and in the kings chamber
- and even stand up hyper cooled Giga data centers so you can make millions serving up sweet sweet inference.

like and comment 'wow this is gonna be a life changing lead magnet'

and I'll send it over. must be connected like this system makes me feel connected to humanities potential birthplace.

If your offer feels flat, do this:

Look at what every other player in your market does. Find the thing customers hate about it.

Position against that.

Same offer. Different angle.

Example: "Growth partner" vs "growth agency."

Same service. But "partner" positions against the extraction feeling people got from agencies for years. Skin in the game instead of invoice-and-disappear.

That one word change shifts the whole frame.

You might have a similar retainer but you make it FEEL like you're aligning with their upside. 

The market cycles though. What worked five years ago might be stale today. What was stale might be fresh again.

Your job isn't to invent a new offer. It's to find the thing your market is tired of and position as the opposite.

All you need to do is make an offer WORTH testing that's it. 

Don't over complicate shit. 

It's offer then offer framing.

"but what about targeting" 

A good offer has the targeting baked in my friend. 

"WTF is framing?" 

frame is how will you can frame the offer around their current day to day situation AKA their worldview. 

if you can do that you are so unreasonably trust worthy that they ACTUALLY BELIEVE YOUR DREAM OUTCOME.

We built a GTM knowledge base for a K-12 EdTech client.

Now claude code is one-shotting newsletter sequences.

Single prompt. Crisp copy. Ready to send.

But what matters is where the knowledge came from: 
1. all of our successful outbound GTM campaigns and the research that fueled them 
2. Sales call transcripts 
3. Direct conversations with the founder to bridge the gap between what is said and what is understood. 

So here's what changed:

Before the knowledge base:
- 3-4 prompt iterations to get usable copy
- Constant corrections on tone and positioning
- Output felt generic, needed heavy editing
- Constant copy and pasting of context + searching notion.

After the knowledge base:
- Single prompt produces ready-to-use sequences via SKILLS
- Tone is dialed in automatically
- References the right proof points without being told
- Now they can instantly turn good newsletters into segmented ones by geography and titles. 
 
The difference isn't the AI.

It's the context.

Here's what we structured:

1. **Voice and tone rules** - How they sound, what words they use, what they avoid
2. **ICP pain points** - Specific problems their buyers have, in their language
3. **Proof points** - Case studies, metrics, testimonials organized by use case
4. **Positioning angles** - What makes them different, framed for different segments

When the AI has this context loaded, it doesn't guess.

It executes.

The pattern:

Most people treat AI like a magic box.
"Write me a newsletter sequence."

Then they're surprised when the output is generic.

The AI isn't the bottleneck.

Your knowledge organization is.

When you invest in structuring your GTM knowledge:
- AI becomes a force multiplier
- Junior team members produce senior-level work
- Output is consistent across channels

The K-12 client went from "AI is inconsistent" to "AI is our fastest copywriter."

Same AI. Better context.

Talked to a founder building AI for private equity recently.

He said something that stuck:

"Every company claims they're AI for private markets. There's so much noise. The question is what engenders trust."

He's right.

In saturated markets, the dream outcome isn't what closes deals.

Believability is.

Here's the thing most people miss:

You don't build trust by CLAIMING results.
You build trust by demonstrating that you understand their world better than they expected.

The way you bridge the gap between "sounds nice" and "I believe you" is how you frame and position the offer.

Some tactics that work:
- Reference investments they've already made ("You hired a head of AI strategy... he probably has coherent thoughts on implementation...")
- Make them feel like they're betting on THEMSELVES, not just you
- Surface problems they didn't know they had

When someone reads your message and thinks "this person gets my situation"... trust is already half-built.

That's why diagnosis beats personalization every time.

The goal isn't to sound different.
It's to prove you see what others miss.

What's the hardest market you've had to build trust in?

The startup journey:

1. Create reasonably good idea
2. Get funding for idea 
3. Pour capital into a website
4. Make Hero Headline: Supercharge your X
5 ???
6. Profit. :


Naw but seriously why do people think this is a strong headline.

I help business owners and VC-backed founders prepare for and execute M&A deals from zero to closure.

We're Singapore's fastest-growing CFO advisory firm, featured by Business Times, CNA938, MoneyFM, TechInAsia, and Straits Times.

Here's what makes us different: 

We don't just build your finance function - we take M&A deals from zero to closure. Whether you need a CFO function that attracts investors, or you're ready to execute a transaction, we handle both sides of growth and exit.

I believe every business owner deserves both financial clarity and deal execution expertise when opportunity strikes. Too many great companies either miss deals because their finances aren't ready, or can't execute when the right buyer appears.

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY:

"Paloe has been an invaluable partner in Dreamcloud's journey to acquisition. Sam Lee and his team clearly have the right ethos, and they were a real asset to have on the team." - Daniel Lim, CEO, Dreamcloud (acquired by Temasek/UST JV)

"They were there when we need to rush out documents and were always willing to go the extra mile to support us. His experience in the fundraising process helps to position the company towards a successful fundraising exercise." - Zhi Zhong, CEO, Geniebook (Series A led by EV Growth and Lightspeed)

"Sam has deep experience in digital business models that helped Express Melody pin-point our key growth drivers." - Jerry Chen, CEO, Express In Music (acquired by Tokyo-listed USEN)

Ready to explore your exit strategy? Book my M&A primer session - learn how to optimize your valuation, navigate the deal process, and understand what money actually hits your pocket after liabilities and post-deal obligations.

Sam Lee

Paloe | CFO Advisory has been ranked #55 on Singapore’s Fastest-Growing Companies 2026 list by The Straits Times  and Statista.

We're grateful. And honestly, a little humbled.

If you’ve been following our journey, you’ll know the last 3 years weren’t about chasing growth at all costs.

We were busy doing the “unsexy” work:
Building strong delivery standards
Training our team properly
Tightening our internal processes
Getting sharper on what we say yes to, and what we say no to

Because in CFO work, fundamentals matter.

If your foundation is shaky, scaling just makes the cracks louder.

The image that keeps coming to mind is bamboo. For a long time, bamboo looks like it’s doing nothing. But underground, the roots are growing deep. Then one day, it shoots up fast. That’s how this phase feels for us.

Deep roots first. Then responsible scaling.

To our clients, partners, and the team that has poured their heart into the craft, thank you for trusting us.

Onwards, with calm confidence, and good governance.

#Paloe #CFOAdvisory #SingaporeBusiness #FinanceLeadership #ScalingUp

Sam Lee Chengyi

CEO, Paloe CFO Advisory | I help businesses become transaction-ready | M&A, VC, IPO preparation | #55 Fastest Growing Company in Singapore by Straits Times and Statista

Paloe is one of the fastest-growing CFO advisory firms in Singapore and as our client base grows, we’re expanding our talent pool in Kuala Lumpur.

We’re hiring: Accountants and FP&A Analysts in KL :)

If you’re exploring your next step in finance, here’s what’s different about this seat:
Most roles expose you to one set of problems in one company.
At Paloe, you’ll work with multiple fast-growing companies as your clients which means you get sharper faster: reporting, forecasting, cash, investor decks, board-level thinking… the full muscle.

And culture matters to us. Ours is deeply ingrained:
Safe - you can ask, challenge, learn quickly
Ownership - you’re trusted to run with things
Fulfilling - your work clearly impacts real decisions

If you’re keen, DM me and we can chat.

If you know someone solid, tag them or forward this, I’d really appreciate it.

#Hiring #KualaLumpur #FinanceJobs #FPnA #Accountant #CFOAdvisory #CareerProgression #SingaporeStartups

I came across a TikTok video about "turtle theory" that hit me hard.

Turtles don't rush. They don't care who's ahead of them. They just keep swimming, one stroke at a time. Through calm waters and chaos, they never change their pace or direction. And somehow, they always reach shore.

Because speed means nothing without the right direction.

A few years ago, I was tasked with transforming our firm from "growing at all costs" to scaling properly. We went through what I call the 3S phases: Soldiering On, Sustaining Growth, and now Scaling Up.

Did the shareholders (including myself) wish things moved faster? Absolutely.

But this video reminded me we've done well. We found our direction first. Now we're swimming one stroke at a time, confident we'll reach shore.

As we enter our 2030 growth plan, I'm quietly confident we'll get there.

To my team at Paloe | CFO Advisory - We will get there. One stroke at a time.

Family heart. Team standards.

This is one of the hardest culture tensions to hold as a founder.

We want a family culture.
One firm, one family.
But we also need a high-performing team.

Here’s the reframe that helped me reconcile it.

Family is about how we treat people.
Team is about what we expect from roles.

When someone walks through our door, we treat them like family.
With care, dignity, and respect.
That includes employees, interns, clients, partners, and even former employees.

But being “family” doesn’t automatically mean this is the best house for them.
And it doesn’t mean they stay on the team forever.

A sports team still needs performance.
You need to train.
Play your position.
And deliver the outcomes the team depends on.

If performance isn’t there, we may not be able to keep you on the field.

But removal from the team is not removal of care.

We can coach clearly.
Set fair standards.
Give support.
And if it still doesn’t work, we exit with kindness and help the transition.

Because the goal isn’t to win at all costs.
The goal is to win without losing our humanity.

If you’re building culture, try this simple line:
Be family in how you treat people.
Be a team in what you expect from roles.

If this resonated, you’re welcome to follow for practical CFO tips.

#leadership #companyculture #startupsg #founders #teamperformance #peopleops #internships

It’s the first Monday of the year, so I’m launching something new today: M&A Monday.

A weekly newsletter where I share one practical tip to help founders prepare for M&A.

Most people think M&A is simply about buying and selling a business.
That’s the headline, not the real story.

The real story is what happens after the deal is signed
How much money actually goes into your pocket
What liabilities still follow you
What obligations you may still be on the hook for, even after you “sold”

A good deal isn’t just a good price.
It’s a clean outcome: cash you can keep, and risk you can sleep with.

If M&A is even a “maybe someday” for you, start preparing earlier than you think. It’s rarely a last minute project.

If this helped, you’re welcome to follow. Every Monday, I’ll share one M&A tip to help you get ready.

If you want a successful M&A, don’t chase valuation. Chase what you actually keep.

I’ve seen this happen often.

A founder thinks they’ve agreed on valuation. Everyone feels good. Then the deal progresses and suddenly the “take-home” keeps moving down.

Not because anyone lied outright.
Because M&A has levers. And if you’re not experienced, it can feel like a fast one.

Here are a few of the most common levers to watch.

Earn-out
The headline valuation looks attractive, but the targets are set so high they’re hard to reach. Your price becomes “maybe later”.

Cash-free, debt-free
Sounds clean. But “debt” can include debt-like items, not just bank loans. Leases, unpaid taxes, deferred payments. These can all reduce proceeds.

Minimum cash
The buyer may require a minimum cash balance left in the company at closing. So even if the business has cash, you may not be able to extract it.

Working capital adjustment
If receivables and payables aren’t at the agreed level at closing, the purchase price gets adjusted.

So the real question isn’t “What’s the valuation?”
It’s “How much goes into my pocket, and what obligations still follow me after I sell?”

If this helped, you’re welcome to follow. Every Monday, I share one practical tip to help founders set themselves up for a successful M&A.

Most people saying “VCs aren’t investing” aren’t lying.
They’re just describing a slice of the market.

I met someone yesterday who told me, “VCs have stopped investing already.”

But on the ground, I’m still seeing Series A cheques being written.

So what’s the disjoint?

Some funds really did pause
Yes, a number of funds are no longer deploying.
But that doesn’t mean the market is dry.
There are still funds with meaningful dry powder. They’re simply more selective.

The “nobody is investing” feeling is coming from portfolio pain
Many VCs are watching their existing portfolio struggle to raise the next round.
And when the previous round had very founder-friendly terms and pricing, the next round becomes harder to justify in today’s market.

Valuations eased, and the bar moved to quality plus governance
This is the biggest shift I’m seeing.
Less growth at all costs.
More show me clean numbers, repeatable unit economics, and proper governance.
Governance means how decisions are made and tracked.

Post Series B is where it’s really tight
Some SEA companies can be market leaders locally, but still struggle when competing for international capital and global benchmarks.

Three extra reasons people miss
Fund cycles: some partners are in reserve mode, not new deal mode
Sector bias: money flows into fewer themes, so the rest feels quiet
Headlines: a few big pauses can make the whole market sound frozen

Takeaway for founders raising Series A
Don’t ask “Are VCs investing?”
Ask “Which VCs are investing in my stage, my sector, and my cheque size, and am I ready for today’s bar?”

If this helped, you’re welcome to follow for practical Startup CFO tips.

#SeriesA #Fundraising #VentureCapital #Startups #CFO #SaaS

Buyers don’t really buy your revenue.
They buy what your revenue represents.

When a buyer looks at your topline, they’re quietly asking three questions.

Can this happen again next month
Repeatability. Steady pipeline, steady conversions, not a one-off spike.

Will customers actually stay
Durability. Renewals, contracts, churn, and whether one customer is too big.

Can I own this business without you
Transferability. Team, process, and a company that runs even when the founder steps back.

This is why two companies with the same revenue can get very different outcomes in M&A.

Revenue matters.
But the real premium comes from revenue that is repeatable, durable, and transferable.

If this helped, you’re welcome to follow. Every alternate Monday, I share one practical M&A tip to help you get ready.

Team Tuesday 2026 Episode 1

Some teams feel “high-touch” because of process.

Ours feels high-touch because of people.

One of the most common feedback we get from clients is:
“You guys really build real relationships.”

When we looked at our CliftonStrengths as a team, one pattern stood out.

More than two-thirds of our team has Relator as a key strength.

Relator, in simple terms, means:
We value deep, trusted relationships over lots of surface-level connections.

What does that look like in client work?

We don’t rush trust
We take time to understand how you make decisions, what pressures you, and what “good” looks like for you.

We follow through
Relators care about reliability. Not big promises, small promises, kept consistently.

We speak human
We translate finance and ops into plain language. Because a real relationship means you feel safe to ask: “Can you explain that again?”

The business impact is real:
When the relationship is strong, feedback comes faster, issues surface earlier, and decisions get cleaner.

And that’s how we move quickly without drama.

If this helped, you’re welcome to follow for practical CFO tips.

#CliftonStrengths #Relator #ClientExperience #Leadership #CFOtips

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Mitchell Keller's LinkedIn Performance

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