How an AI Startup grew from $0 to $3M ARR in 8 months

At Lyzr AI, we grew from $0 to $3M in Contracted ARR in under 8 months. In this blog, we provide insight into how we did it. We will share our playbook in a detailed, step-by-step breakdown of our most effective marketing strategies.

Whether you’re a startup founder or a marketing professional, we hope you can also use these tactics to accelerate your growth.

The journey of how we built Lyzr from an idea into a company generating $3M in ARR in less than 8 months, wasn’t a straight path, but through a lot of experimentation, fast iterations, and leveraging the right strategies, we’ve hit major milestones. 

The Journey

Lyzr started as an AI data analysis app (PowerBI+ChatGPT), but we struggled to gain traction. We had our share of setbacks—rejections from YC, AIGrant, and HF0—but instead of giving up, we pivoted. We realized that enterprises needed something different: reliable, fully private AI agents. So we pivoted, building Lyzr as an Enterprise Agent Framework, and that’s when we found our market fit.

Our initial growth came through some creative problem-solving: we scoured Upwork for job postings related to ‘Langchain’ support. By building rapid prototypes for these clients, we generated $100K in ARR in just four months. But our real growth spurt happened when we launched Jazon, an AI SDR agent, after seeing a tweet from Jason Lemkin where he was looking for AI agents to automate research, outreach, and sponsorship sales for the SaaStr Europa event.

That single move generated 250 leads in just 10 days.

Here’s the practical playbook that powered our growth from $0 to $3M in under 8 months.

The Growth Playbook

Here are the strategies we used, step by step, with some key takeaways that can help you replicate our success.

1. Email Campaigns: Personalization at Scale

We knew email would be critical to our success. But the challenge was doing it in a way that didn’t feel like a generic, automated blast. Enter Jazon, our AI SDR agent, who made it possible to craft personalized, automated email campaigns at scale.

Step 1: Craft a winning template. Keep it brief and focus on the customer’s needs. Here’s the exact email template Jazon used:

Step 2: Set up automated follow-ups. Jazon sent 3 follow-up emails, spaced 2 days apart, and we made sure to respond quickly to any replies.

Step 3: Measure and iterate. We constantly tracked key metrics like open rates (we hit 63%) and deal win rates (we saw an 11% win rate).

We used these insights to refine our content and approach.

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💡 Lesson: Automate your follow-ups, but keep the personalization. Always be testing, optimizing, and adjusting based on real results.
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2. Affiliate Marketing: Scale Through Others

We didn’t have a huge marketing budget, so we leaned into affiliate marketing early. We made sure the program was attractive enough for affiliates to want to partake, and it became one of our top channels for growth.

Step 1: Choose the right affiliate platform. We used ReferralHero to manage everything, from signups to tracking performance.

Step 2: Create a compelling offer. Our affiliates earned $100 for each qualified lead and $400 in monthly recurring revenue for every sale made. The lifetime incentive kept them motivated.

Step 3: Manage relationships. While we were scaling, we ensured open communication with affiliates, kept them engaged, and made sure they were being fairly rewarded.

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💡 Tip: Your affiliate program should be a win-win. The more lucrative and simple it is for affiliates, the faster you’ll scale. The more top-of-funnel the reward, the more attractive for affiliates to join.
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3. SEO Content Strategy: Using AI to Dominate Search

We knew SEO could drive a lot of inbound traffic, but we didn’t just create content for the sake of ranking. We used an AI-first approach to analyze competitors, find gaps, and create content that truly added value.

Step 1: Conduct keyword research. We focused on high-volume, low-difficulty keywords in our niche.

Step 2: Competitor analysis. We analyzed the top 5 ranking blogs for our target keywords, looking at character count, keyword use, and structure. Then, we built content that outperformed on every front.

Step 3: Create AI-driven content. We didn’t stop at SEO. We focused on creating engaging content that added more value than what was already ranking. The result? A steady stream of organic traffic.

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💡 Lesson: Don’t just write for SEO—write for your audience. Use AI to streamline and scale your process, but always focus on providing value.
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4. Paid Advertising: Test Small, Scale Big

When we started with paid ads, we didn’t go all-in right away. We began with a modest $2,000 budget and focused on optimizing every dollar spent.

Step 1: Keyword strategy. We started with 5 broad match keywords, keeping a close eye on performance. When something wasn’t working, we pivoted fast, while doubling down on what was working.

Step 2: Continuous optimization. We constantly monitored results, tweaking targeting, ad copy, and keywords to maximize ROI.

5. Experimentation and Iteration: Move Fast, Learn Faster

At Lyzr, our biggest strength was rapid experimentation. We didn’t stick to one strategy for too long. If something didn’t deliver results within 8 weeks, we cut it and moved on to the next idea.

We ran multiple strategies at once, experimenting with new tools, platforms, and approaches. The ones that worked, we scaled. The ones that didn’t, we dropped. This relentless focus on iteration is what propelled our rapid growth.

Conclusion

Remember, the key to our success was rapid experimentation and iteration. Don’t be afraid to try and fail at new tactics, but be disciplined about cutting what doesn’t work.

We hope you can use this playbook and adapt it to your unique circumstances so you, too can accelerate your company’s growth.