Mandeep Taunk, Co-Founder and Chief Growth Officer of CodeConductor shares his journey from marketer to entrepreneur and highlights the significance of GTM strategies. He discusses leveraging customer data for growth, identifying product-market fit, navigating the tech adoption landscape, and crafting marketing plans that balance immediate revenue goals with long-term brand development.
Could you tell us about yourself and your journey from marketer to entrepreneur?
It was at 383 Media that I went from marketer to entrepreneur, but the roots had already been laid out an entire decade before while I was a senior in college. I started in various marketing roles during my sophomore year, including lead generation and copy development. In my senior year, I joined a search advertising agency, and my first account was with Petco. Working at the agency helped me understand how people search and interact with information online. It also helped me understand basic growth metrics like LTV and CAC and cemented my interest in paid search marketing.
Fast forward to 2006, when I joined MyPoints, an online loyalty program, as their Head of Member Acquisition. At Mypoints, I learned about various lead generation strategies and new marketing channels. Using that experience, I left MyPoints in 2010 to start a media agency. My initial clients were consumer software companies, and I realized that many of their products used white labeling services. That gave me the idea to start publishing my software titles and apply tactics I used for my clients for my company. I would scale the business to $15 million in annual revenue before selling it in 2016.
Life completely changed in 2017 when my son was diagnosed with leukemia at the age of 4. Being an entrepreneur is demanding, so I focused on my son and family by returning to corporate roles. Over the next 5 years, I would work in various roles at Adara, a travel data company, and Upstart, a fintech company, including product marketing, demand generation, and growth engineering. In 2022, two years after my son’s bone marrow transplant, I returned to entrepreneurship with Birdsong Tea, a project my wife and I had dreamed of for years.
Can you tell us about CodeConductor and why you joined as a co-founder?
CodeConductor is a fantastic platform designed to simplify creating apps and AI copilots. Our platform has overcome many of the challenges in traditional app development by focusing on helping founders and IT departments deliver apps quickly and go to market faster.
Paul Dhaliwal, the founder of CodeConductor, came to me earlier this year to showcase the power of his platform. I fell in love with it immediately. Plus, Paul and I had already worked together at 383 Media, where he was my head of engineering, so I knew this was rock solid.
How does tracking customer purchases help make targeted GTM decisions, and what are the key factors to focus on for optimal results?
User and customer tracking are the lynchpins of any growth campaign. As growth leaders, we must understand who our buyers are and their preferences. That starts as soon as a user arrives at our website. We need to know how they discovered us, what solutions they browsed, and what stage they are in to better deliver them value. Our goal is to make this process as frictionless as possible.
Once a user starts using our platform, we aim to truly understand our north star. At what point does the customer decide to become a customer? It could be the usage of a feature, average time on the platform, or some form of implementation. After that, customer lifetime value becomes the focus as we work to provide value. Segments and clusters will naturally form if we have good customer data.
Tracking customer purchases is about more than just conversion rates. It is about figuring out how to continuously deliver value over time. At CodeConductor, we use Segment to ingest data, ActiveCampaign to manage our customers, and Amplitude to analyze product data.
What are the early indicators of a product-market fit, and how should businesses leverage user feedback to refine their products?
The most reliable indicators are usually strong user retention, engagement, growing demand in organic channels, and referral growth. I also like to use is net promoter score to determine how excited customers are in telling others about our product.
Feedback is essential to consistently delivering value. It comes through sales feedback, surveys, interviews, product reviews, and customer support interaction. I also like creating a product leadership council that brings customers together to discuss their challenges. These customers will also become your biggest champions.
“The most reliable indicators of product-market fit are usually strong user retention, engagement, growing demand in organic channels, and referral growth.”
How do you ensure your marketing plan incorporates immediate revenue objectives and sustainable lead generation for long-term brand growth?
It all starts with a strong messaging plan. When your message is clear and aligned with your value proposition, building long-term growth for your brand is inherent and will drive leads. With all the marketing tools and collaboration platforms we have today, ensuring compliance and consistency with every group, whether product, sales, or customer support, is easier than ever.
Additionally, content marketing plays a large role. By producing high-value content, you attract and educate prospective customers while positioning your brand as a thought leader, building credibility over time, and leading to better conversion rates.
Tell us about your most interesting product GTM rollout experience so far.
I joined Upstart in 2021 as Head of Marketing for the auto retail division. My first act was to rebrand Prodigy Software, an e-commerce platform for automotive dealers, to Upstart Auto Retail with only two consultants. We developed a plan and began rolling it out in just 4 months. The results were terrific. We generated strong press coverage, including an interview on CNBC, and built a strong sales pipeline.
The rollout involved developing a unified messaging strategy that showed how we were the platform of the future and how we would revolutionize the car-buying experience for millions of customers through AI. We continued to leverage this messaging for 2021 and 2022, generating a 350% growth in customers from 200 dealerships to 700 dealerships in about a year.
How do you measure the success of your marketing and growth strategies, and which tools do you find the most effective?
Success in marketing involves both quantitative and qualitative data. Quantitative metrics include customer acquisition cost, lifetime value, conversion, and retention rates. These provide a clear picture of how effectively we are attracting and retaining customers. On the qualitative side, I like collecting customer feedback, surveys, and reviews to understand the reasons behind the numbers.
More importantly, we must craft a story to make it easy for others to understand. “We retained 98% of customers because of a new feature’s capabilities” is stronger than saying, “We retained 98% of our customers.” The latter leaves it up to the receiver to decide why. No two people will ever come to the same conclusion, diluting the value you’ve created.
Looking ahead to 2025, how do you envision the tech adoption landscape, and what trends should entrepreneurs and growth marketers watch?
The tech adoption landscape will probably be defined by the rise in AI and automation in 2025. I envision 2025 as the year of productivity. We are already seeing a shift towards AI copilots and autonomous tools that enhance productivity, and this trend will continue to grow. Small businesses will also use AI to get the same efficiency as enterprises. At CodeConductor, we simplify the creation of applications through AI, making it easier for businesses of all sizes to build without much technical expertise. I feel that the democratization of technology can be a great equalizer.
What advice would you give fellow GTM leaders and budding entrepreneurs?
Get comfortable with change. Many GTM leaders get comfortable with the status quo, are and then go into panic mode when the market shifts. I’ve been in that position, and it’s not pretty. To stay ahead, investing at least 20% of your resources towards experimentation is critical. Â Explore new channels, try new messaging, or introduce new product features. Be in a constant state of innovation.
CodeConductor is an AI-powered platform revolutionizing app development by enabling businesses to create, own, and deploy custom AI agents and applications without coding. Designed for flexibility and collaboration, it empowers users to streamline workflows, build scalable internal tools, and innovate rapidly. With production-ready code generated in seconds, CodeConductor eliminates platform lock-in, offering seamless deployment across cloud services, Kubernetes, VMs, or bare metal. It simplifies workflows, accelerates development, and transforms business operations efficiently.
Mandeep Taunk is an experienced entrepreneur and growth strategist, known for his journey from marketer to co-founder of CodeConductor. He began his entrepreneurial path with 383 Media, scaling it to $15M in annual revenue. His career includes pivotal roles at Adara, Upstart, and MyPoints, where he led demand generation, product marketing, and growth strategies. After a life-changing personal experience, Mandeep returned to entrepreneurship in 2022 with Birdsong Tea, showcasing his resilience and passion for innovation.
