How lemlist Achieved $37M ARR: Michel Lieben 🧠 Breaks Down Their Funnel

In a recent LinkedIn post, Michel Lieben 🧠 breaks down the impressive growth strategy behind lemlist, a company that has achieved $37 million in Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR), adding over $1 million in net ARR each month. Lieben compiled insights from lemlist’s CEO Charles, VP of Sales Yann, and Head of Growth Erwan to offer a detailed look at their successful funnel.

The analysis begins by highlighting lemlist’s multi-channel approach to lead generation, which drives approximately 200,000 monthly site visits. A significant portion of this traffic is attributed to LinkedIn, where a dedicated team leverages personal branding. Lieben points out that:

“10% of their team has a personal brand: Kévin (79K), Lucas (57K), Erwan (37K), Guillaume (36K), Tal (35K), Charles (34K) … amounting to 300,000+ followers.”

As Michel Lieben 🧠 explains, each team member focuses on a specific ‘sub-niche’ on the platform, contributing to a diverse and robust presence. For instance, Erwan shares growth experiments, while Guillaume discusses entrepreneurship and SaaS, and Charles offers insights into scaling a business from $30 million to $100 million.

Leveraging Multiple Channels for Lead Generation

Beyond LinkedIn, lemlist employs a diversified strategy that includes paid advertising, SEO, partnerships, YouTube, and outbound efforts.

Paid Advertising Strategy

Michel Lieben 🧠 notes that lemlist invests around $20,000 per month in paid ads across LinkedIn, Google, and Meta. According to the insights compiled, Google ads are effective for capturing high-intent searches, while LinkedIn is favored for Account-Based Marketing (ABM) campaigns targeting larger enterprises.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO contributes about 15% of lemlist’s signups. Lieben highlights their success in ranking #1 for competitive keywords like “multi-channel prospecting tool.” Furthermore, they build authority through comprehensive meta resources, such as cold email templates, and by producing multi-lingual content that performs well in various regions. The use of mini-tools, like a free email finder, also plays a crucial role in their SEO strategy.

The Power of Partnerships

A particularly striking element of lemlist’s growth, as detailed by Lieben, is their partner program, which is reportedly responsible for approximately $4 million in ARR. The post mentions that the methodology behind this success was shared in a detailed podcast by the program’s builder. Partners who promote lemlist receive a 25% referral fee, facilitated by platforms like PartnerStack and managed through Notion.

Content Marketing: YouTube and Personal Brands

lemlist maintains a strong presence on YouTube, with over 451 videos published on their company channel, amassing over 1.3 million views. The post also touches upon Guillaume’s successful entrepreneurial journey on YouTube, including growing an English channel to 46.3K subscribers before launching a French channel that quickly gained 24.1K subscribers.

Internal Use of the Product for Outbound

Michel Lieben 🧠 emphasizes that lemlist utilizes its own multi-channel prospecting tool extensively for internal outbound efforts. Their process involves sourcing high-fit organizations via Sales Navigator, identifying key contacts, enriching lead information using lemlist, and enrolling contacts into multi-channel campaigns within HubSpot. The team even uses lemlist’s VoIP feature for cold calling.

“For sourcing: Source high-fit orgs (Tier 1) via Sales Navigator (this is taken care of by their GTM Engineer) Extract 3 most relevant contacts from each company. Using Sales Nav again, find extra relevant personas. Add all leads to HubSpot Enrich info via lemlist.”

This internal application of their product serves as a powerful testament to its capabilities and helps refine their sales process.

Lead Capture and Conversion

The post concludes by touching on lemlist’s lead capture success, with 20,000 organizations signing up for free trials monthly and over 1,000 demo requests per month. Michel Lieben 🧠 indicates that further details on their funnel were continued in the comments section of the original LinkedIn post.