Why This EdTech Startup Hired Marketing Before It Had a Product

Most early-stage EdTech companies build in a familiar order: product first, sales next, marketing whenever there's budget left over. It's an understandable instinct in a sector where school budgets are tight and every dollar needs to prove itself quickly. But that order also means many companies spend years chasing the credibility they could have built from day one. Karen Borchert, founder and CEO of Alpaca, a school culture and teacher retention platform, took the opposite approach. When she started the company four years ago, her first hire wasn't an engineer or a salesperson. It was a marketing leader, brought on the payroll before Borchert herself was. That decision has shaped how Alpaca has grown into a trusted name among school leaders with a small team and a category that didn't fit neatly into anyone's existing playbook. The conversation traces how that early bet on marketing played out: a listening-first culture that shaped Alpaca's brand before it ever built software, a resource library that earned trust with principals long before any sales conversation began, and the hard lessons about when long-term brand building needs to give way to a more direct sales motion. **What You’ll Learn** - Why Alpaca's founder hired a marketing leader before she was even on payroll, and what that decision signaled about how the company planned to grow - How a "listen first" approach, including days spent interviewing educators for what became a book-length story, shaped Alpaca's brand and messaging from the start - Why earning trust with school principals meant giving away complete, standalone value, like a full resource library, instead of gated previews of the product - How pairing every resource download with CRM data turned free content into a warm, ready-to-call sales pipeline - Why Alpaca initially avoided conferences, and what changed once the team started booking meetings on the spot instead of just showing up with a booth - How keeping marketing and sales leaders working side by side, rather than in separate lanes, kept both teams aligned as the company scaled **Why it Matters** Most EdTech marketers are told to prove ROI fast, which often means marketing gets treated as something to add later, once there's revenue to defend it. Alpaca's experience complicates that narrative. Every dollar the company put into brand and listening before it had a sales team became the foundation that made later sales conversations easier, not a distraction from them. For marketers working with tight budgets and skeptical school buyers, the lesson isn't to skip short-term tactics like conferences or paid outreach. It's to recognize that the trust those tactics eventually convert depends on credibility built well before anyone asks for a demo. **Resources Mentioned in this Episode:** - Alpaca Resources Hub - Free downloadable resources created for school leaders and educators, including the staff recognition and culture-building tools referenced throughout the episode. - The School Culture Report 2026 - Referenced during the discussion of educator wellbeing, leadership confidence, and school culture trends. - The Secret to Sales & Marketing Success? A Shared Revenue Mindset - The earlier LCG episode with Dan O'Reilly that Elana references when talking about sales and marketing working in lockstep. - Little Wins Newsletter - Alpaca's weekly newsletter for school leaders, the same low-lift, high-trust channel Karen described building from 200 subscribers to thousands. - Alpaca - Karen's company site. - Karen Borchert on Substack (Team Letter) - Karen's real-time chronicle of building Alpaca, referenced when Elana points listeners to it for more of her story. - Karen Borchert on LinkedIn