Growth gets easier to manage when the team can see what's working, what's guesswork, and what should stop.
About Daniel
I've been the founder with a working product and a flat chart at 2am.
I started Image To Painting in 2013, building a direct-to-consumer business that I eventually sold to a US competitor. Later, I co-founded PsycApps and helped bring eQuoo, a mental-health app, to market. Building businesses taught me how quickly good ideas run into practical problems with positioning, acquisition and getting customers to stay.
Typical clients are B2B SaaS or AI at roughly £1M–£20M ARR (or the equivalent stage in your market), ~10–50 people, and the founder still owning weekly GTM decisions.
Why founders work with me
I have led marketing and growth inside companies as well as working with founders. As Head of Marketing at Shoprocket, I helped grow monthly active users from roughly 400 to 20,000. At NAVA, our work helped reach 30,000 app downloads and improve retention by 40%. More recently I was Growth Director at Ladder and held an interim Head of Marketing remit for Xe in the UK and Europe. Through We Scale Startups, I have worked on more than 20 in-depth startup engagements, with £18M+ in revenue influenced and £6M+ in paid acquisition spend managed across separate projects. I also mentor founders through GrowthMentor, Google for Startups and Techstars, and have taught startup growth at Cambridge Judge and Imperial.
Teaching style
Practical, direct, and built around the next decision.
Whether it is a mentoring session or a keynote in front of a Cambridge cohort, the approach is the same: take a messy growth question, separate signal from noise, and make the next commercial decision easier to see. No theatre, and no complexity added for the sake of looking thorough.
If you have sat through a pitch that was mostly frameworks with no through-line to your actual problem, you know what I am trying to avoid. The methodology behind this work is 520 slides deep, built on patterns from 100+ startups across 12 countries, but in a session it shows up as a sharper diagnosis and a clearer next step rather than a slide deck.
Outside the work: I am usually reading something about behavioural economics, watching a founder pitch something they are genuinely excited about, or navigating a new city with a camera and a bad sense of direction. UK-based, working across the UK, US, Europe, and APAC.
Principles
How the judgment shows up in the work.
These are less rules than the things that have proven consistently true across 100+ startup engagements in 12 countries.
01
Find the real bottleneck
Before adding spend, clarify whether growth is breaking in positioning, activation, retention, measurement, or team decision-making.
02
Turn evidence into choices
Good research and data should reduce ambiguity for the team, not create a bigger reporting ritual.
03
Leave a system behind
The best engagement makes the team better after it ends: sharper priorities, clearer rhythm, better hiring or handoff paths.
Operating History
Where the point of view comes from.
Founder-side experience, in-house operating roles, advisory work, and public teaching. The chapters marked ongoing are still active today.
2013–2016
Founder: Image To Painting
Built an ecommerce business from the ground up, running acquisition, pricing and suppliers, and sold it to a US competitor.2015–2019
In-house: Shoprocket & NAVA
Head of Marketing at Shoprocket (2015–2016), then Head of Growth & Marketing at NAVA (2017–2019), spanning positioning, acquisition, retention and partnerships.2016 → now Ongoing
Advisory: We Scale Startups
The advisory vehicle for fractional CMO, mentoring, content, and speaking across SaaS, AI, fintech, and innovation-led teams.2018–2020
Co-founder & CMO: PsycApps / eQuoo
Helped launch and grow a mental-health app, leading positioning, early acquisition, partnerships and distribution.2019 → now Ongoing
Teaching & mentoring at scale
Google Launchpad, Techstars, GrowthMentor, Cambridge Judge Business School, Imperial College London, General Assembly, UK Space Agency. 400+ sessions delivered, 4.94/5 rating.2024 → now Ongoing
Current focus: founder-led GTM systems
Post-PMF B2B SaaS and AI startups at £1M–£20M ARR, typically 10-50 people, with a functional product but inconsistent GTM: sharper customer insight, message-market fit, prioritisation, creative testing, and a repeatable growth cadence. Next Step
If this sounds like your current situation.
The fit is strongest with B2B SaaS or AI teams at £1M–£20M ARR, 10–50 people, where the founder is still making most of the weekly GTM calls and growth feels more reactive than designed. The Fractional CMO page breaks down scope, 30/60/90-day priorities, and where to start. For named founders and specific outcomes, the testimonials page has the evidence.