Build Your GTM Playbook

Find your growth lever: How 2 reports drove $500K in pipeline

I found that breakthrough GTM growth often comes from doing less with greater focus.

This insight led to an unexpected discovery when I was at Loop Returns, where I generated over $500K in pipeline using two core pieces of content.

They became part of my growth lever.

So today I’m going to share how you can find and leverage your unique growth lever for your GTM playbook.

The 10% That Moves Growth

Matt Lerner, former PayPal growth leader, discovered that company growth comes down to a handful of key moves instead of doing everything.

In a First Round Review article, Lerner shares how PayPal's massive success traced back to the following strategic bets:

1. getting eBay sellers to use the product

2. focusing on dev relations

3. partnering with e-commerce platforms

This insight led Lerner to develop an approach for finding "growth levers" - the 10% of work that brings 90% of results. Your GTM strategy will have this too.

The challenge becomes identifying your lever and developing scalable ways to pull it.

Finding and Activating My Growth Lever

When I joined Loop Returns as their first dedicated agency partner manager, I inherited a familiar playbook: buy the agency team lunch, do a product demo, and hope they remember us when their clients ask about returns.

And the tech-partner ecosystem in Shopify had become saturated with partner managers demanding client referrals without offering real value in return.

With limited resources, I knew I had to do something different to stand out.

Without even knowing it, I was following Lerner's method:

1. I mapped the agency customer journey to find bottlenecks

2. I interviewed agency teams to understand their core motivations

3. I ran rapid experiments to test potential growth levers

This process revealed that turning return data into meaningful insights could be my lever. To execute on this, I had to:

1. package this insight effectively for agencies

2. develop scalable ways to deliver it

3. build reusable components that would drive consistent results

This is where Alex McEachern's "three-suit framework" came in - using a few reusable components instead of building something new for every situation at each agency.

It was the ideal approach to activate my growth lever.

Building the First "Suit"

Using data from Loop's 3,000+ merchants, I showed agencies how their clients' return performance compared to similar brands in their category.

I called it the return analysis report.

The report was also modular. Once I had benchmark data for different brand categories (women's shoes, men's apparel and etc) and different return solutions (manual returns and various competitors), I could customize reports for any agency.

This first "suit" solved multiple problems:

• Gave me natural access to agency client lists without being demanding

• Provided value to agency account strategists without adding to their billable hours

• Created a systematic way to identify brands that fit Loop’s ideal customer profile

• Leveraged unique data that agencies could exclusively share with their clients

Evolution to the Second "Suit"

The success of the return analysis report revealed another opportunity with agencies whose clients were already using Loop.

This lead me to creating the return optimization report - my second "suit."

When I discovered an agency had a client using Loop, I would analyze the brand's return data to identify opportunities that aligned with the agency's core services.

This included using return insights to improve product page copy and photography, enhance site navigation, and optimize the overall customer experience.

These one-on-one report reviews I did became valuable education sessions, helping account managers understand Loop's capabilities.

As account managers grew more confident with the product, they began proactively discussing returns solutions with their other clients.

This second suit transformed my agency partnerships from opening doors to actively supporting their client services, enabling account managers to independently identify and act on return optimization opportunities.

Turning Framework into Pipeline

The analysis report and optimization report weren't just random tools.

They emerged from systematically finding and activating a growth lever.

My journey matched the pattern Lerner discovered at PayPal. I started by mapping how agencies worked with their clients.

This revealed that account managers felt overwhelmed with requests, yet wanted to bring more value to their clients.

The rapid experimentation phase proved essential.

I began with basic comparison data in my reports. Each conversation with an agency taught me something new.

Their feedback shaped these documents into more than sales tools. They became a way to build trust and educate partners.

The results surpassed every metric:

• my first version of the analysis report generated $192,000 in pipeline

• as the approach matured, it generated over $500,000 in pipeline the following year

• most importantly, returns transformed from a back-office headache into a business growth opportunity in agencies' minds

Find Your Growth Levers

Here's how you can apply these approaches to find and activate your own growth levers.

First, identify your lever using Lerner's method:

1. Map Your Customer’s Journey

   I noticed agency account managers invested heavily in monthly strategy meetings. Instead of creating new touch points, I built reports that enhanced these existing meetings.

2. Dive into customer motivations

   Agency managers didn't want tools. They wanted to be valued partners to their clients. My reports helped them achieve this by turning return data into actionable insights.

3. Run experiments

   Start simple and iterate. My first report compared three data points across similar brands, leading to the creation of the second report.

Then, activate your lever using the "suit" framework:

1. Start with one piece that solves multiple problems

2. Make it modular for quick customization

3. Focus on delivering value first

4. Look for natural evolution points where one "suit" can lead to another

5. Double down on what works instead of building something new

Success comes from resisting the urge to create something new for every situation.

Instead, find your lever, build your "suits," and keep refining them based on results.

Remember: the goal of this exercise isn’t to have just three enablement pieces.

It's to have versatile components that can be recombined to solve various challenges.