When I joined Nava Benefits as the second marketing hire, the company was disrupting the traditional brokerage model by delivering higher-quality benefits without inflated costs. The challenge was significant: the industry was staunchly sales-led with no established inbound playbook, and we needed to build an entirely new pipeline function from scratch to find prospects open to rethinking their benefits approach through a modern lens.
I launched a multi-channel testing strategy, starting with low-cost tactics like webinars, email marketing, and owned content to validate our approach. We sponsored and attended industry events to build trust, then expanded into lead magnets, paid advertising, and a field marketing program. Our strategy centered on adding value and educating prospects rather than hard selling. This helped us target decision-makers actively looking to modernize their benefits strategy. Throughout hundreds of experiments, I tracked cost per lead and lead-to-opportunity conversion rates. In true startup fashion, our tracking was messy but effective, and we constantly reevaluated why customers chose us to refine our messaging and targeting.
This ground-up approach ultimately led the pipeline to double year over year. By year 4 we generated $20M in qualified pipeline. Beyond the pipeline number, we established repeatable acquisition channels and a testing framework that positioned Nava's growth team to scale sustainably as the company grew.