Welcome to the second part of our series: Expert Voices @ Kalungi. You can read part one here. Today's guest is Kalungi's Co-Founder and Head of Technology, Fadi George!
In this edition, Fadi shares his insights on:
Fadi George starting his career in the agency world in New Zealand, offering web development and SEO services, then expanding to offering full inbound marketing services.
“I helped my first New Zealand based SaaS company out, which was great. They now own 60% of their world's market share in their vertical.”
After moving to the US, Fadi focused on driving growth for B2B SaaS companies, validating the inbound methodology working globally. Later, he then co-founded Kalungi with SaaS marketing mastermind, Stijn Hendrikse. Kalungi was founded on the T2D3 framework, a proven playbook for mastering B2B SaaS go-to-market strategies, scaling businesses, and making smart growth decisions.
Fadi shares his thoughts on what he believes is the biggest marketing trend: "The most called-out marketing technology is AI, but it's such a broad term.”
Fadi says that marketers are currently using GenAI tools like ChatGPT to draft blogs, clean data, and conduct market analyses.
However, he believes the future of scaling marketing lies in one particular AI tool: AI bots. AI bots can be used across all departments. In marketing, they can handle repetitive, manual tasks, such as responding to social media conversations.
He also points to predictive analytics as a big change for marketers. It will enable marketing pros to ask questions and get recommendations based on their data. Predictive AI will also change how marketing teams run campaigns and do A/B tests, allowing them to understand patterns faster.
“When you're thinking of building a marketing team, you should consider AI as a good skill set because what we found now is: the most efficient marketers are generating really good results.”
“At Kalungi, we hold ourselves accountable for customers’ results. The only reason we can do that is that we work with bulletproof data, solid attribution, and reporting that allows us to make those decisions in order to drive results.”
Fadi loves working with data because it’s the scientific part of marketing. You can track inputs and see the results of each campaign. If you can’t test and validate your branding, messaging, and campaigns with data, then you don’t know if they’re resonating with your target audience.
With the right CRM, you can know which initiatives led to which results, allowing you to make informed decisions for your next strategy.
Without the right CRM, your marketing and sales are lost. Your data needs to be organized in one central place. From there, you can analyze campaigns and make informed, strategic decisions. Without that information, your marketing is just guesswork.
Fadi gives us an example of a Private Equity firm that Kalungi worked with. The firm bought three different companies and merged them together. Each company used a different CRM. They had different tools, products, and subscriptions. Fadi and his team worked to centralize data in HubSpot, providing real-time customer insights and a full list of active customers with just a click.
Before this adjustment, all of their data had to be exported and manually edited, which wasn’t reliable. In less than two months, they had full visibility and understanding of their customers. The PE firm also used Kalungi’s playbook on product-led growth to increase sales, automate emails, and track performance.
Fadi outlines the two most common mistakes he sees founders make with their CRM:
Many companies consider CRM setup an internal project, but hiring a full-time CRM specialist can be difficult and expensive. A more efficient solution is to bring in an agency for a few months to get your CRM in place. Once it's done, only light maintenance is needed.
To judge the quality of CRM work, you need to look at three aspects:
“I have a strong opinion about what CRM to use for marketing, and it’s HubSpot. Don’t bother looking at anything else.”
Fadi is a HubSpot Champion User. He believes it has the best data and analytics on the market to enable strong data-driven decisions and marketing results.
Using HubSpot, Fadi’s team set up complete GDPR compliance for a German-based company. The company’s tools connected to HubSpot, and all needed to be compliant. Ultimately, they used HubSpot’s flexible system to build their CRM technically, present data optimally, and be completely GDPR compliant. The team also managed to use HubSpot’s database functionality to show customers different consultants based on the region in which they were located.
Fadi’s insights showcase why he’s a driving force behind Kalungi’s success. From identifying the role of AI in marketing to emphasizing the importance of bulletproof data and the right CRM, his approach combines technical expertise with a strategic mindset. As companies navigate the complexities of modern marketing, having the right tools, processes, and expertise is no longer optional—it’s essential.
At Kalungi, we believe that investing in the right infrastructure, like HubSpot, and leveraging expert knowledge, like Fadi’s, empowers SaaS founders to scale their businesses with confidence.
Stay tuned for the next installment of Expert Voices @ Kalungi.