Dadoum Labs

We help you create GTM Strategies you can ship 
and empower your teams to scale fast.

1️⃣ AI Trainings for Mid-Market/Enterprise companies (EN/FR) 

We run hands-on AI trainings and workshops for companies. 
We tailor the experience to the company's AI reality and real world challenges.
Teams leave with actionable assets and a new mindset.

Trusted by: Conseil de l'IA & du Numérique, L'Oréal, Zeliq, IGN France, Station Numixs...

2️⃣ AI-powered Go to Market Strategy for B2B
We design allbound GTM strateges that combine inbound proof with outbound speed.

Get 5x content output in 60 days, x2 reply rates on targeted outreach.

Trusted by: La Growth Machine, Giro Music, Taiyo, Activators, Ascend Group...

Founder | Making AI work for your business

The Product Buildcamp

We help product teams go from idea to a real product with AI in a single weekend.

We compress the entire product loop into 48h using AI tools:
problem validation, 
Market & user research
strategy, 
scoping, 
AI MVP building, 
delivery, 
GTM, 
business planning 

so teams leave with something strangers will actually pay for.

- Cofounded the event series with Javier & Impostor PM.
- Co-designed the curriculum, 
- Wrote and animated the workshops
- Handpicked the tools and prompts to use
- Handle the partnerships
- Ran the outbound campaigns

The Product buildcamp #1 - Lisbon
- 20 attendees
- 5 teams
- 5 ⭐️ reviews
- 5 partners: Replit, Elevenlabs, Synthetic Users, Productized, Critical techworks

DM if you want to bring it to your city.

Co-Founder & Trainer

Buska 🔍

Keep track of every mention of your Brand online.  Convert social mentions to leads

Built it from idea to #3 Product of the Day on Product Hunt in 45 days

Co-Founder & Product Manager

Schoolab | Mission-driven company

I guide entrepreneurs on their Go To Market Strategy and how to build their Minimum Viable Product more effectively

1️⃣ PERQO
- Workshop lectures " MVP: from idea to clients" 
- Coaching  sessions: 6 months with an entrepreneur

2️⃣ Station NUMIXS
- 
- AI Conference : " Find more clients using AI"  
- Workshop lectures : " MVP: from idea to clients"  
- Workshop lectures : " MVP: build a Go To Market Strategy"  

-----
🔍 What is Schoolab?
Schoolab is an innovation studio where creativity, entrepreneurship, and education come together to create impact.

Coach & Lecturer - AI Go To Market & MVP for entrepreneurs

The Product Courier

84% of CPOs consider mastering AI as a crucial skill for Product Managers in the next 3 years. 

We built this community to share quality resources to help Product Teams leverage AI in the work 

- Curated library of prompts 
- Tutorials for Use Cases
- Slack Community 
- Videos and tips 
- Weekly Newsletter
...

Join us and learn to work smarter.

Co-Founder

lemlist

We help businesses and lead Agencies start conversations with their prospects 
thanks to ultra-personalization at scale.

Product Manager

lempire

Descriptif
Working to make the core product - lemlist - even better by leveraging AI to bring the most value to customers : 
- make the right bets on my scope 
- deliver value to users & to the Company 
- collect and analyze feedbacks through continuous user feedback loops
- monitor product KPIs and take Data informed decisions 
- work closely within the Building Trio and align with all stakeholders in squads
- Participate in the refinement of the Product Strategy
- Define and Coordinate Go To Market Launch strategies

Noé

🚙  I worked for a month for @Blablacar, on the following Roadmap problem : « How to increase the success trip rate for newbie drivers ? »

🎯 Product strategy and problem framing :
 - Data (Excel, SQL, Python) on Blablacar Datasets
 - Data Analyse of 10K App Reviews,
 - User research (25 User Interviews)

🥇 I Prioritized problems based on impact on chosen metrics, and tech cost ( MoSCoW)

🤖 I Prototyped (Figma) and iterated on 3 solutions with the highest impact on the KPI relevant to our problem

📝 Covered specs (Jira), delivery processes with the Lead Dev & defined a Rollout strategy

🖥️ Final Presentation to Kevin Aguiri, Senior PM @Blablacar and Guillaume Parra, Product Designer @Blablacar

Product Manager @Blablacar 🚙

Credit Du Nord - Société Générale Group

I was Branch Manager and Startup Advisor for the Bank : 
- I worked closely with 250 Startups on their financial needs
- I managed 2 Startup Advisors
- I sharpened my Product Sense by studying > 200 business models of Startups looking for a loan
- I became an Expert on the French Startup Ecosystem 
- I managed Partnerships for our clients (Incubators, Tech Lawyers, Brokers, VC ...)
- I analysed and validated Post Seed  (> 700K€) & Post A Series loans
- We managed Capital Deposits and Capital increases within 3 working days ✅
➡️ PNB YtoY : 140 % ✅

Manager - Startup Advisor

Banque BCP - BPCE Group

I was Responsible for Refining and structuring the services and products dedicated to SMB and Corporate Clients.

I led the following missions: 

🎯 Discovery: Define the Target audience and SMB persona through extensive market research, data analysis and client interviews

🎯 Product Strategy & Roadmap prioritization 

🎯 Delivery and Product Launch of several products :
- Employee Savings : ✅ Sales x 50
- Loan Guaranteed by State - PGE : ✅ Creation and launch within 2 weeks  ✅ XXX M€ loans
- E-Commerce solutions : Launch of 3 complementary solutions (Contactless, BNPL, E commerce)
- PSD2 Solutions : successful delivery (Roadmap, QA testing, rollout plan) of secured authentication services

- Coordination / Budget and Planning of technical dev. with the IT Team
- Product Team Management

🎯 Product Marketing : 
- Coordinating the Product Roadmap and Communication roadmap 
-  Drafting the "message" for each product
-  Creating the internal supports (sales Decks, Documentation, Trainings, FAQ ...) 
-  Creating the external supports (Webpage, Sales Ads, Print...) 

🎯 Internal Products 
- I led the redesign of the validation process for product launches : creating validation flows in Teams
✅ reduced the validation time X2

Head of Product - Small & Medium Businesses

I help B2B Startups take their products from idea to revenue in weeks not months | Fractional Product Growth & B2B GTM Expert 🛠️ | Get a free 1:1 audit ☎️ | Founder of Buska.io 🔍

AI won’t replace your team. 
But companies who know how to use AI will leave yours behind.

In the past 2 years consulting for B2B companies, I have seen numerous teams waste time and money on “AI initiatives”: 
- Theoretical trainings that employees would never use in their job.
- AI feature pilots because of FOMO but with no real impact on revenue. 
- Testing AI platforms for Go-To-Market with scattered actions and no strategy.

I decided to do things differently and built a hands-on approach to grow with AI. 

Today, I train mid-market/enterprise teams to use AI for real work : 
-> tailored workshops and sessions built around the company's needs. 
No hype, no generic demos — just hands-on learning and assets your team can use the next day.

🫶🏻 Join companies like Le Conseil de l'Intelligence Artificielle, LOréal, Numixs, Zeliq....

For founders and SaaS leaders want to go further, I step in as a consultant to design their AI-powered GTM strategy:
I help craft an actionable plan, show them how to find buying signals, personalize outreach, and build a repeatable process to get more clients fast.

🫶🏻 La GrowthMachine, Taiyo, Ascend, or Giro Music trusted us to boost their growth. 

**How I help**

Hands-on AI Training (EN/FR): 0.5–2 day workshops using your real cases and tools. 
Teams leave with assets, not just notes.

AI-Powered GTM Sprints (5 weeks): We build the strategy and growth engine, messaging, and a runbook your team can run with.

What drives me?
I want to see companies grow their business with AI, not talk about it.
I get a kick out of seeing people go from “not sure where to start” to “here’s how we’ll win the market.”

If you’re done experimenting and want real results, let’s talk.
👉🏻 https://cal.com/tonidossantos/audit

Toni Dos Santos

Last week's key AI releases are pointing to the same direction:
AI wants to live in your browser.

💻 OpenAI launches ChatGPT Atlas Browser
⚔️ Microsoft announces Edge Copilot Mode with Agent capabilities.
👋 Meet Mico, the new AI Clippy
 🧠 Claude gets full memory
 🏢 ChatGPT adds Company Knowledge

 AI companies are not just fighting for models anymore.
They are fighting for interfaces, to meet us where we are. 
-----
Have you tried Atlas?

Making AI Work for Your Business | Get hands-on AI Trainings for your team | Build an AI powered GTM strategy you can ship

Weekly Roundup 

AI product launches drop faster than you track them. Most are noise.
Here are 5 AI new features that matter :

- Google Veo 3.1 update generates cinematic videos with native audio and object insertion. 

- Anthropic Claude Skills ships plug-and-play workflows that load only when needed. Lighter than MCP for many use cases. And usable with ChatGPT.

- Claude Haiku 4.5 model drops.  Cheaper, Fast enough for low-latency flows. Strong coding benchmarks.

- ChatGPT app for Slack adds search, recap, and drafting inside Slack. with Two-way sync with your ChatGPT account.

- Microsoft MAI-Image-1 lands in the top-10 on photoreal leaderboards. Rolls into Copilot and Bing Image Creator.

Which feature will you try first? 
-----

The Roundup

Most founders treat an MVP as a mere prototype. 
Last week at Le Perqo, we showed 10 entrepreneurs wrong.

I asked them to pitch their project in one sentence:
They talked solutions. Focused on features. Tech. 
Hardly any details on who they were building for or why.

We flipped the script in 90 minutes.
→ Reframe from "I built X" to "I solve [problem] for [ICP]" 
→ Focus on problems that are Painful, Urgent, Recognized.
→ Strip MVP to one feature solving one specific pain 
→ Test payment intent before coding

Their feedback made my day (100/100).

The pattern repeats everywhere. 
Founders spend months building solutions before solving problems.
Validation beats perfection. Speed beats scope.

Applying the S.O.L.V.E. framework forces the right questions early. 
Spot one specific problem. 
Offer only one solution. 
Launch fast. 
Validate with market demand. 
Expand with proof.

Thanks to Julien and Nathan for having me, 
and big shoutout to the amazing entrepreneurs incubated at Perqo.
-------
DM me if you need a sparring partner to validate demand without burning six months on unasked features.

NotebookLM just added Nano Banana and new styles to Video Overviews.
Every Marketer should test this today.

Most internal product announcements fail because of format, not content.

Your feature spec is solid. Your positioning is clear. Your deck is comprehensive.
But nobody reads your 40 slides.

Use NotebookLM's video overview to make it appealing: 

1) Upload your existing docs (specs, PRDs, release notes)
2) Generate narrated video in Brief or Explainer format
3) Add custom instructions to specify the focus of the video
4) Choose visual style between: Watercolor, Papercraft, Anime, Whiteboard, Retro Print and Heritage.

Below is an example I crafted to teach a client's Marketing Team about Alex Hormozi's "100M system" for their product launch.

Don't spend days making "the perfect deck" that gets skimmed in Slack.

Try NotebookLM. 
No Loom recording. 
No slide design. 
No video editing.
Just your content, narrated and illustrated, in under 10 minutes.
---------
PS : we detailed 5 NotebookLM features every Product Marketer should use. Read all about it on Vibe Product Marketing

Here are 6 AI releases that matter this week:
From robots folding laundry to ChatGPT turning into your DJ.

🧠 Google Gemini can now use a browser
🏢 Google launched an AI hub for enterprises

🎧 ChatGPT connects to Spotify
⚙️ OpenAI Apps & AgentKit open a full AI ecosystem

And 
🤖 Figure 03 robots go into production with real home assistance skills

👉 Swipe the carousel for details.
-----
🫶🏻 Follow more actionable AI tips.

AI Roundup  131025

How I got teams to actually consume my enablement docs.

Product Marketers spend a lot of time crafting perfect enablement docs.
Only to see Sales/Product/CS teams scroll through it for 8 seconds...then close it forever.  

The problem isn’t the content. It’s the distribution.
The teams don't hate enablement.
They’re just drowning in docs.
Each team needs content that fits their time and habits. 

You need to adapt your content to each.
Same insights. Different formats.

That’s why I started using NotebookLM as my Product Marketing studio.
Turning dense docs into audio briefs, flashcards, and videos to share.

I tested every feature of NotebookLM.
I detailed the 5 that actually make PMM work get read.

Read all about it in this week's Vibe Product Marketing Newsletter. 
------
Share this if your sales team hasn’t opened your battlecard since Q1.

Only 4% of the world uses ChatGPT for work.

Over 700M people use ChatGPT.
But only 30% (200M) use it for work.
While 5,6 billion people have access to the internet.

This means you are not late to the “AI party”.

Find an underserved niche
Find a problem worth solving
Find out how AI can solve it quickly
Build a solution.

Don’t make excuses. 
Stop watching from the sidelines. 
Make a difference.
-----
Happy Friday

She contacted 87 leads. 
20% replied. 4 leads requested a quote.

No trick. No fake numbers. 
We just applied our GTM framework to he concert booking strategy.

I used to book jazz/world music concerts 15 years ago. 
My former music partner reached out over the summer. 
She runs her own booking agency now. 

Market got brutal. Venues cut budgets. 
Competition increased. Resources disappeared.

She was struggling to book concerts with Cultural Centers in France. 

These venues often prepare their next season within 3/4 months 
My friend didn't have enough time to call each music programmer. 

She would send them marketing emails with her artist roster. 
No replies. Tagged as spam.

She tried to email programmers manually to grab their attention.
No replies. Time consuming.

After analyzing her situation, I saw the artists were not the problem. 
The pitch and outreach process was. 

So we rebuilt her approach using the framework I run with B2B SaaS founders.

1) Step one: niche down and segment
→ Mapped venues by size, audience demographic, seasonal programming calendar 

2) Step two : research buyer pain by segment. 
→ Identified gaps where her roster solved specific venue needs 
→ Built targeted list of promoters to contact

3) Step three: rebuild positioning from pain back. 
→ Rewrote openers to lead with venue programming challenges 
→ Positioned artists as solutions to those needs
→ Moved achievements as supporting proof

4) Step four: multi channel sequences
→ Personalized emails tied to venue research 
→ Warm LinkedIn DMs when connection existed 

We started small to test the new approach with a first list of <150 promoters. 
She sent it end of September.

A few weeks in, we checked her results: 
87 leads contacted
20,5% replies
4 concert quote requests

Same roster. Same market. Different approach.

How? 
Because the mechanics of our system work across every industry. 
Buyers need problems solved.

The main challenge? 
You cannot replicate the exact SaaS GTM tactics.
In cultural industries you are not dealing with features and competitive benchmarks. 
You are dealing with emotion and art. 
We adjusted the system to be (even) more human.
-----
DM me if you want to audit your current GTM strategy through our system and framework.

6 AI launches worth your scroll this week: 
I read all the news so you don’t have to. 

🤖 1X NEO — A calm home robot ... that needs teleoperation to learn.
 🎨 Google Pomelli — Drop a URL. Get ready-to-post branded content.
 ⚡ Google Vibe Coding — free Prompt to working app inside the AI Studio.
 💻 Cursor 2.0 — Multi-agent coding with a faster Composer model.
 🧠 Canva Creative OS — New Design model. Video 2.0. Growth tools unified.
 📊 Claude in Excel — Finance workflows powered by live market data.

Major players are moving from generalist AI to verticalized expert tools.

The Roundup - Nov. 3rd

Impostor syndrome does not fade with experience. 
It compounds.

Before my first AI workshop I expected failure. 
Reasonable. I was new to it.

Three years later I train non technical teams at Large Companies and Institutions. CEOs,Product managers. Marketers. Sales. C-Level execs.
But the pre-session panic still hits the same.

Twenty minutes before start I always expect the worst : 
The audience will tune out, 
I won't teach them anything relevant, 
I'll waste their time.
The session ends up and I assume I added nothing new. 

Then, reviews tell a different story:

→ "My favorite part was the workshops (...) I really loved the content and the way you presented it."⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 
→ "I really enjoyed your presence and presentation style, with conviction and confidence."⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 
→ "You reach people, you can feel your enthusiasm and pass it on to others."⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 
→" Even as an Online Business Manager and AI consultant, I was able to discover new tools and especially appreciate a very accessible pedagogical approach"⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 
→" Thanks Toni for being a great IA teacher."⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 

I am grateful that I could make a difference and help them grow in their work. 

But the Impostor voice never quiets. 
Gap between self doubt and impact taught me one lesson. 
Don't let the inner voice take over.
Deliver the work. Let outcomes speak. Keep going.
----
How do you handle impostor syndrome ?

The biggest Music Industry event in France starts today: 
MaMA Music & Convention. 

We hear many talks about AI will replace labels and booking agents.
Wrong.

The value of AI is speed and signal detection, not creative judgment.
Bookers still negociate deals and promote artists with passion. 
Curators still choose playlist flow. 
Labels still need to put their artists in the spotlight.

Let AI handle the tedious work that buries decisions under 20 hours of admin a week:
→ Automated lead scoring ranks venues by booking history and genre fit 
→ Social listening surfaces trending artists before they hit major playlists 
→ Targeted outreach automation helps book more call to engage conversations.
→ AI content creation to promote artists across channels... 

The goal is not to replace.
It's to free agents to focus on relationship-building talks. 

AI finds the signal. Humans make the call.

If you want to talk about AI, DM me to grab coffee between MaMa conference/showcase sessions.

Zaqlick

Chief Executive Officer

Adlega

Contractor

Salesforce Consultant

TRADEBYTE

Operational Excellence and Efficiency Team Leader

Knauf IT 

Salesforce Project Manager

Deloitte Digital

Senior Consultant

EPAM Systems GmbH

Salesforce.com Consultant/Product Owner

Project Manager

Building startups

I’ve started three companies, survived two pivots, and bailed countless founders out of spreadsheet purgatory.

Today, I’m the CEO of Adlega, a SaaS runway‑planning platform trusted by 1,200+ founders to model cash burn in under 90 minutes. Nights and weekends, I’m building Zaqlick, a “first‑mile” discovery layer that lets early‑stage teams chat with AI personas trained on real market data (think Reddit rants, competitor reviews, and support tickets). You ask, they answer, and your next customer interview starts miles deeper.

Why build both? I’ve wasted months guessing what users really cared about. The result: half‑built features, burned runway, and an inbox full of polite maybes. Adlega keeps the money math honest; Zaqlick flips the discovery script so you ship with confidence, or kill the idea early and save the coffee budget.

What lights me up:
- Digging through messy, unstructured data and surfacing non‑obvious opportunities.
- Translating growth metrics into plain‑English roadmaps.
- Swapping war stories with builders who still have more questions than answers.

Track record:
- Bootstrapped Adlega, now powering runway models for 1,200+ founders worldwide.
- Former CMO who turned a flat‑lining freemium app into a $2.4 M ARR engine in 18 months.
- Kellogg‑WHU EMBA (because numbers + narrative > numbers alone).

Let’s talk!
If you’re an indie hacker, accelerator grad, or curious VC who thinks discovery and finance should be equally data‑driven - DM me or join the Zaqlick waitlist 👉 zaqlick.com.

Elena Tsemirava

“You have to find a cofounder.”

That’s what everyone told me.

I believed it for 4 years.

I tried five times. Every attempt failed. For a different reason.

Here’s what happened:

👤 Attempt 1: Legal panic.
He read the founder agreement, panicked, and ghosted.

🏠 Attempt 2: Financial fear.
“If this fails, I could lose my house.”

💸 Attempt 3: VC salary dreams.
Expected to raise money immediately—and get paid.
We didn’t even have a product.

⚙️ Attempt 4: Hobby mindset.
Wanted to play with the tech, not build a business.
No users. No deadlines. Just tinkering.

⌛ Attempt 5: Misjudged the work.
Smart guy. But bailed as soon as it got hard.
Expected MVP in 3 weeks. It wasn’t.

After 5 heartbreaks, I realized:

A misaligned cofounder is worse than no cofounder.

So I stopped searching.

I learned to code.
I leaned on my research skills.
I built my own product—Zaqlick.

I’m not saying solo is easy.
I’m saying waiting is worse.

If you’re stuck waiting for the “perfect partner”…
Maybe you already have everything you need to start.

Shipping beats searching. Every time.

—

✳️ I’m building Zaqlick - data-driven personas that act like a focus group.
Built solo. Based on real data.

Entrepreneur & data-backed GTM advisor | Zaqlick founder - living personas from public conversations | EMBA, coder, espresso lover

I used to wait for user interviews.
A calendar invite. A nod. A yes.

But people talk before they agree to talk.

In threads. In comments. In “does anyone else…” confessions.

They’re already telling you what hurts 💥

You just have to go listen 👂

Unfiltered > rehearsed.

I’ll take a raw post over a recorded call, any day. 

-- 👋 Hey, I’m Elena Tsemirava.

I’m building Zaqlick, your AI-powered cofounder for customer discovery.

If you're tired of guessing what users want, I share teardown threads, battle-tested frameworks, and behind-the-scenes from building Adlega (1,200+ founders) and now Zaqlick.

Follow me for smart, scrappy ways to validate faster.

And join the waitlist to chat with your future customers before you build. (Link in bio)

Mastery comes before entrepreneurship if you want real results.

I learned that the hard way.

For 20 years I tried to build on titles and energy.

I could pitch. I could plan. I could not deliver the same outcome twice.

At 45, in Germany, with two kids and no network, I went back to basics.

I did EMBA, learned Python and data science. Not for a certificate. For repeatable results.

Business sits on a craft you can depend on.

If you skip that, you try to buy fixes from outside. Marketing, sales, packaging. None of them fix a weak core.

Here’s the readiness test I use now.

✅  Define your craft outcomes. Keep a simple results log with what you did and the result it produced. Action. Metric. Timeframe.

✅  Practice causal thinking. When something fails, write two changes you will make before you do it again. Then run it.

✅  Price for thinking. Scope analysis and decisions into the fee. Clients pay for judgment, not just hands.

✅  Stack accountable reps. Take work where you own a KPI. Predict it. Hit it. Then increase the scope.

✅  Do not use entrepreneurship to escape a boss. Use it to accept more responsibility.

This is how I build Zaqlick.

We turn real calls and market data into synthetic personas so founders and Product Managers can test messages before they build.

I keep a live log. Prompts changed. Datasets updated. Acceptance rates. Time to insight. If it breaks, I change the pipeline first, not the landing page.

I listen to data, but also to myself.

If I cannot point to three results I can repeat, I keep training and take more accountable projects.

Do the reps. Make your own calls. Earn it with craft.

I’m not there yet. I’m still learning.

--- 👋 Hey, I’m Elena (Mira) Tsemirava.

I’m building Zaqlick, your AI-powered cofounder for customer discovery.

If you're tired of guessing what users want, I share teardown threads, practical frameworks, and behind-the-scenes from building Adlega and now Zaqlick.

Follow me for smart, scrappy ways to validate faster.

And join the waitlist to chat with your future customers before you build. (Link in bio)

Founders often treat Reddit like a place to drop links.

It’s better as a research engine.

Scan threads for:
– Repeated complaints
– DIY workarounds
– Unanswered “how do I…” posts

That’s where you find real tension. And real opportunity. 

-- 👋 Hey, I’m Elena Tsemirava.

I’m building Zaqlick, your AI-powered cofounder for customer discovery.

If you're tired of guessing what users want, I share teardown threads, battle-tested frameworks, and behind-the-scenes from building Adlega (1,200+ founders) and now Zaqlick.

Follow me for smart, scrappy ways to validate faster.

And join the waitlist to chat with your future customers before you build. (Link in bio)

Want to stop asking leading questions?

Practice interviews. With peers. With yourself. Even out loud.

Or: rewrite every question 3x until it’s:
– Specific
– Non-binary
– Contextual

Good interviews don’t start with smart answers. They start with better questions.

-- 👋 Hey, I’m Elena Tsemirava.

I’m building Zaqlick, your AI-powered cofounder for customer discovery.

If you're tired of guessing what users want, I share teardown threads, battle-tested frameworks, and behind-the-scenes from building Adlega (1,200+ founders) and now Zaqlick.

Follow me for smart, scrappy ways to validate faster.

And join the waitlist to chat with your future customers before you build. (Link in bio)

Something strange just happened with Paddle! And I really need help from someone on their team.

I had a meeting scheduled to discuss Zaqlick’s onboarding. We’re a SaaS platform helping founders validate ideas and run early customer discovery.

But my meeting request got rejected because Paddle flagged Zaqlick as violating their AUP under “Human Services.” Seriously??!!!!

That’s… completely WRONG!!!!!

 Zaqlick is a pure SaaS, no human services, no marketplaces, no adult content - nothing even close.

Now I can’t get through their CRM or support channels, and it’s blocking us from moving forward.

 The only “person” I can talk to is their AI assistant on the website. No human contact anywhere!

It’s honestly worrying how easily a legit SaaS can get misclassified! 

Especially when the first-line sales reps act without understanding the product. 

It feels unprofessional and damaging for startups trying to do things by the book.

If anyone from Paddle or the broader SaaS founder community can help me connect with the right person there, I’d really appreciate it.

This seems like an honest mistake, but it shouldn’t be this hard to fix.

🙏 Any help or contacts at Paddle would mean a lot.

Research Doesn’t Start with Questions. It Starts with Listening.

The best founders don’t start with an interview.

They start with eavesdropping (ethically).

People talk about problems in public, raw ways, especially in comments, forums, and support threads.

Tune in. Build pattern recognition before you speak.

That’s the first mile. 

-- 👋 Hey, I’m Elena Tsemirava.

I’m building Zaqlick, your AI-powered cofounder for customer discovery.

If you're tired of guessing what users want, I share teardown threads, battle-tested frameworks, and behind-the-scenes from building Adlega (1,200+ founders) and now Zaqlick.

Follow me for smart, scrappy ways to validate faster.

And join the waitlist to chat with your future customers before you build. (Link in bio)

A small SOM can build a bigger life than a giant TAM.

I learned this in boardrooms and at my kitchen table.

In corporate, we worshipped the TAM slide. It made plans look big and safe. It also hid execution. Timelines slipped. Budgets grew. No one owned a buyer.

With Zaqlick, I did the opposite. I picked a slice I could actually serve. One buyer. One painful job. One channel I can staff and support.

Progress got real.

Here is how I cut a crisp SOM you can win now.



1️⃣  Delivery reality. Who can you reach and serve today given your geography, language, uptime, onboarding, and support capacity. If you cannot deliver it, it is not your SOM.

2️⃣  Rules and risk. Regulations, procurement rules, data residency, and industry norms shrink your SAM. Treat them as design inputs, not footnotes.

3️⃣  Switching behavior. Some customers will not move this year. Model lower conversion and longer cycles. Assume you are earning trust, not flipping a switch.


Then run the SOM play.

✅  Tighten focus. One buyer, one problem, one channel. Everything else parks in the backlog.
✅  Model the base case. Revenue, support load, CAC, cash runway. Build the team you need for this slice, not the imaginary future.
✅  Expand by evidence. After you earn 1-5% of SAM in that segment, add the next adjacent segment that shares delivery logic.

A simple numeric frame helps.

▶️  Say there are 10,000 target accounts in your region. 
▶️  Reachable this year: 40% due to channel and coverage. 
▶️  In-budget and qualified: 25%. 
▶️  Will actually switch in 12 months: 20%. 
▶️  That leaves 200 accounts in your SOM. 
▶️  At 400 per month, that is roughly 960,000 ARR. 
▶️  Stack 3 adjacent segments with the same delivery logic and you cross 2.5-3M ARR with clarity, not fantasy.

Why this matters.

💡 A 10M business changes lives. 
💡 A 100M business creates dynasties. 
💡 Both start by winning a specific slice with discipline. 
💡 Not by selling a story about a continent you cannot reach yet.



Pick your slice. Prove your capture rate. Fund the plan you can deliver. Then expand with evidence.

Never give up.



--- 👋 Hey, I’m Elena Mira.

I’m building Zaqlick, your AI-powered cofounder for customer discovery.

If you're tired of guessing what users want, I share teardown threads, battle-tested frameworks, and behind-the-scenes from building Zaqlick.

Follow me for smart, scrappy ways to validate faster.

And join the waitlist to chat with your future customers before you build. (Link in bio)

Obvious Questions Kill Early Research 

Most early-stage interviews fall flat because founders ask the wrong questions.

❌ “Would you use this?”
❌ “Do you like the idea?”

These don’t reveal urgency, context, or tradeoffs.

✅ Better:
– “How are you handling this today?”
– “What have you tried that didn’t work?”

Pain-first, not pitch-first. That’s how good discovery starts. 

--- 👋 Hey, I’m Elena Mira.
I’m building Zaqlick, your AI-powered cofounder for customer discovery.

If you're tired of guessing what users want, I share teardown threads, battle-tested frameworks, and behind-the-scenes from building Adlega (1,200+ founders) and now Zaqlick.

Follow me for smart, scrappy ways to validate faster.
And join the waitlist to chat with your future customers before you build. (Link in bio)

Your customer just said "fine."

But your AI flagged it as high-risk frustration.

Here's what it saw that you didn't.

Modern conversational AI doesn't just read words.

It reads patterns humans miss in real-time.

Three signals that scream hidden frustration:

1️⃣  Response length collapse

When messages drop from 15+ words to 3-5 words, something shifted.

"I've been trying to resolve this billing issue for three days" → "Fine."

That's not agreement. That's resignation.

2️⃣  Punctuation intensity

Single periods carry weight.

"Ok." vs "Okay!" vs "Ok..."

Each dot, exclamation, or ellipsis changes meaning entirely.

AI tracks punctuation frequency across the conversation thread.

3️⃣  Word choice degradation

Formal language breaking down signals emotional shift.

"I appreciate your help" → "whatever works" → "fine"

The AI maps vocabulary complexity over time.

Why context windows matter more than keywords:

A single "fine" means nothing.

But "fine" after 6 back-and-forth messages, shorter responses, and dropped pleasantries?

That's a customer about to churn.

The AI doesn't just analyze the current message.

It analyzes the conversation arc.

This is why legacy chatbots failed and modern AI succeeds.

Rule-based systems saw "fine" as positive sentiment.

Context-aware systems see "fine" as a red flag when the pattern shifts.

The result?

Priority routing before the customer explicitly complains.

Proactive solutions before they ask for a supervisor.

Better outcomes because the AI caught what the words hid.

Conversational AI isn't reading minds.

It's reading patterns we're too busy to notice. 

--- 👋 Hey, I’m Elena Mira.
I’m building Zaqlick, your AI-powered cofounder for customer discovery.

If you're tired of guessing what users want, I share teardown threads, battle-tested frameworks, and behind-the-scenes from building  Zaqlick.

Follow me for smart, scrappy ways to validate faster.
And join the waitlist to chat with your future customers before you build. (Link in bio)

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