Nina joined us in our early days, even before Funnel was Funnel. She was working in what today would have been a customer success role; today, she is head of product. In this blog post, you will learn more about an early SaaS start-up's exciting times and challenges, what we have accomplished since then, and what challenges lay ahead.

Can you tell us a bit about yourself and your role in the company?

I live outside of Stockholm with my husband, two kids, and a new kitten. During my free time, I love to explore the outdoors by backcountry skiing, sailing, or camping. However, nowadays, most of my free time is spent planting trees in the garden and completing the top floor of our new house.

I recently returned from my maternity leave and assumed the role of Head of Product. At Funnel, we have three heads of products, and we all report to Fredrik, our CEO. Our primary responsibility is to develop the product in line with our company's vision and strategy. To achieve this, we work collaboratively with our VPs of engineering, engineering managers, and head of designs to formulate a product strategy.

However, my most critical responsibility is to ensure that the product managers who report to me are motivated and have all the necessary strategic context, support, tools, skills, and competencies to excel in their roles.

Can you tell us a bit more about Funnel's history?

I joined before Funnel was Funnel. I started in January 2012, and at that point, we had a product named Qwaya, and we were seven people. Qwaya was a self-serve product with a trial period that helped Facebook advertisers take their advertising to the next level. My role was to make sure that the people who signed up for the tool understood it, bought it and kept using it. But since we were so few, I did a little bit of everything. 

I really liked that everyone was very involved and hands-on in those early days. It was easy to move fast; everyone knew what was most important, and we worked closely together to solve problems. During my first years, I learned so much about building a company, online marketing, and product development, even though my role was more on the commercial side at that point. 

After a few years, we changed course and introduced Funnel. The process of watching an idea and a sketch in a Google Slide come to life as an actual product was incredibly thrilling. Initially, our co-founders Fredrik and Pelle presented Funnel to marketing leaders while Sven, who worked as chief product officer, and I were demoing and setting up customers' subscriptions. People were very excited and impressed by how unique Funnel was when they first saw it.

What have you learned at Funnel?

A lot! But one of the most important things I’ve learned is to be picky about selecting your peers. Having great peers who are knowledgeable and can inspire us has been a crucial factor in our success.

In a product-based company, it is essential that every employee has a good understanding of the product, the customers and the domain. This knowledge is necessary for selling, supporting and building the product. Transparency is also crucial, and we ensure that everyone has access to the correct information and context they need.

I’ve also learned that communication can be challenging, but it is vital for a company to function smoothly. 

What challenges will the product team face in the future?

AI and privacy have disrupted our domain, and it's essential that we adapt to this new paradigm to meet our customers' needs. We have set very high goals for 2024, and to achieve them, we need to make significant changes to our product. Historically, we have been successful in maintaining a stable product and making smaller changes. However, implementing more extensive modifications that span across various parts of the product has proved to be challenging.

What were the main challenges in hiring in the early days of Funnel?

In the early days of Funnel, it was a challenge to find people with relevant previous experience in our domain. For instance, when I first joined Funnel, customer success was not yet an established domain. At that point, there were not many SaaS companies in Stockholm. As a result, most people were not even familiar with the term customer success. 

Later, when our co-founder Pelle and I went to Boston to open an office and establish a team, we discovered that the customer success domain existed there. This led to an increased number of applicants compared to the Stockholm market. However, we encountered new challenges in Boston. We wanted to establish a company culture that was similar to the one we had established in Stockholm. 

Both our co-founders, Fredrik and Pelle, believe that a company's success depends on having great people and a great culture. Therefore, we wanted to set the same standard for our Boston office. I'm happy to say that we were successful in creating a culture that is similar to our Stockholm office, although each office has its own unique flavor.

What competencies were you looking for when hiring in those early days?

In the early days of hiring, we looked for individuals who possessed a strong interest in technology, product development and were eager to learn new things. We aimed to hire self-starters who took accountability for their own learning and were considerate of their colleagues' time and energy. It was essential for us to bring in people who were passionate about contributing to the success of our product and company, regardless of titles or prestige. 

We preferred individuals who had previous experience working in a start-up environment, as they would be able to grasp the domain quicker and gain a better understanding of our product.

What has changed in terms of what we are hiring for today?

The exciting part is that, even though we have pivoted, iterated and gained more knowledge on how to build a successful SaaS company, the attributes we were looking for in those early days are basically the same attributes we are looking for today. 

Additionally, the culture we were trying to establish back then is still fundamental. We have always wanted to build a fantastic company to work for, and this is still what we want to continue creating.

Read other blog posts on the topic ‘Lessons learned at Funnel’ with Louise, Vitor, Mark or Emma.