How Expandly Cracked Cold Outbound After Years of Partnership-Led Growth
From partnership-dependent to a working outbound channel. RevenueFlow found Expandly’s exact ICP among a huge pool of e-commerce sellers and booked 17+ qualified conversations in the first three months, with the first leads landing in weeks.
The problem we stepped into.
Expandly had built a strong pipeline almost entirely from partnerships.
It was a powerful source, but cold outbound to their ideal customer was the one motion they had never cracked.
They had taken a few stabs at it over 18 to 24 months, even employing someone who had done it before, yet it took six months just to build the infrastructure and nine months before they saw any real momentum.
The target was hard to reach: a specific cohort of e-commerce sellers at the right moment to expand out of their domestic region, filtered on revenue, category and intent, and rarely advertising themselves as a fit.
“It genuinely feels like an extension of our team, not an external partner.”
Why they chose RevenueFlow.
- 01A collaborative onboarding that captured exactly who Expandly wanted to reach, then flexed as the team learned
- 02Leads arrive pre-qualified and intent-checked, so discovery calls start with no surprises
- 03Strategy, technology and a managed SDR handling replies, all running as an extension of the team
- 04Attention to detail, fast response times, and a shared Slack channel for easy support
| Criteria | Other vendors | RevenueFlow |
|---|---|---|
| Onboarding | Light, generic setup | Collaborative, captured the exact ICP and flexed as we learned |
| Lead qualification | Surface-level, surprises on the call | Intent-checked before the conversation |
| Depth of detail | Not substantial with past providers | Deep understanding that sharpens over time |
| The relationship | An account manager and a queue | An extension of the team, one shared Slack channel |
What we built across the engagement.
Same intelligence system we run on every engagement: diagnose, architect, launch, compound.
Pinpoint the ICP.
Defined Expandly’s exact target among a huge pool of e-commerce sellers: brands at the right moment to expand out of their domestic region, filtered on revenue, category and intent. Weeded out the sellers only posing as a fit so the list matched who Expandly actually wanted.
Build the engine.
Stood up the full outbound stack, messaging and sending infrastructure, so Expandly had a working channel in weeks rather than the six months it had taken to build in-house. No SDR to hire, no tools to source and wire together.
Launch and qualify.
Started booking conversations within weeks, with every reply managed and qualified. Leads reach the team already understanding the business and their own intent, so calls open with no surprises and more value for both sides.
Learn and sharpen.
Iterated on targeting and copy through onboarding and beyond, flexing as the team learned. The longer RevenueFlow and Expandly work together, the more precisely the motion reaches the right sellers.
“Before a lead gets to us, they already understand our business and, more importantly, their own intent. When they come on the call, there are no surprises.”
What doing it yourself would take.
- Recruit and hire a dedicated sales rep
- Train them, then manage them day to day
- Write and build every outbound sequence
- Wire up the tech, the tags and the automations
- Work out what actually converts, by trial and error
- Run and monitor the whole motion every day
- Stay on top of every positive reply, in real time
- And wait months before any of it gains momentum
- One team that already knows what works
- Sequences, copy and tech built and run for you
- Every positive reply caught, qualified and managed
- Running as an extension of your team
- Qualified conversations within weeks, not months
Every item on the left is a job in its own right. Together they are a team, a tech stack and months of setup, replaced by one partnership that runs as an extension of yours.
Results in a nutshell.
| Metric | Before RevenueFlow | After RevenueFlow |
|---|---|---|
| Primary lead source | Partnerships only | Partnerships plus a working outbound channel |
| Time to momentum | Around nine months in-house | First qualified leads in weeks |
| Discovery calls | Surprises, mixed intent | Pre-qualified and intent-checked |
| Team overhead | Hire, train, manage, tool up | Handled as an extension of the team |
Hear it from Expandly.
Drew Cooper · Head of Sales, Expandly
“It’s far more valuable to work with them than to build this yourself.”
Scaling together.
The longer the partnership runs, the more precisely it reaches the right sellers. What began as cracking cold outbound is becoming a durable, predictable channel that sits alongside Expandly’s partnership-led growth, run as an extension of their team.
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