Melissa Tan
Startup Advisor & Angel Investor. On 1 show, 1 appearance. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
operatorinvestorexecutive@melissamtan ↗LinkedIn ↗
Melissa Tan is a technology executive best known for leading growth and monetization initiatives, having served as Head of Growth at Webflow and leading Dropbox’s B2B growth. As an advisor and angel investor, she has worked with fast-scaling tech companies including Canva, Grammarly, Miro, Apollo.io, and The Browser Company.
1shows
1appearances
18statements
1resolved
0supported
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0%fully supported
7said about them ↓ Everything Melissa Tan said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Tan: Prep calls give the best hiring signal on PM candidates
“Something that I do that I learned a few years ago that was super helpful is I, so I always have a presentation component to the interview process that checks for prepared thinking, communication, And I recommend a prep call between the two of us before that p…”
Tan: PM interview presentations should tackle company problems, not past work
“I know some folks will be like, oh, we have candidates present on something they've worked with in the past. I've tried that form and it's really difficult because I found that candidates even Sometimes spend tons of time sharing the context of that company. A…”
Tan: Deep channel expertise in early growth hires causes false precision
“I actually think the more expertise someone has, the more It actually can lead to, like, false precision, and then thinking they know what they're gonna do. And especially, like, I don't think you actually need paid marketing expertise till much later, when yo…”
Tan: Dropbox started its enterprise sales motion too late
“I think a learning was that we just started our sales motion and our enterprise a little bit later than we should have. And a lot of competition caught up to us.”
Melissa Tan: In 2013 Tech Culture, Growth and Revenue Were Taboo Concepts
“Back in 2013 in tech, growth was kind of like this dirty word and revenue was a dirty word. And so we were like, oh, a good product should sell itself.”
Melissa Tan: Monetization and GTM Must Be Built Into Product From Day One
“I think the best way to execute is just to have that be front and center from the start. What is our go-to-market strategy? How are we thinking about monetization and having that infused into how you think about product development?”
Tan: Early-stage companies rarely execute sales and PLG simultaneously
“Initially I think most companies are leaning heavier into sales or heavier into product-led. You're usually not doing both at the same time.”
Tan: Early Employees Build User Intuition Analogous to Founder Intuition
“I think people talk a lot about founder intuition and that
Intuition that founders just have.
I actually think that extends to early employees too, that have built a ton of context on the user, on how to get things done at the company.”
Tan: 0.5% conversion wins do not matter for early-stage startups
“That company X might be at Dropbox, where every .5% improvement and conversion makes a difference, but if you're early stage, it doesn't matter, and you need to actually think bigger.”
Tan: Canva's revenue ownership was initially managed by finance
“So early at Canva, it was owned by finance and that's because finance had a view on everything happening in the business.”
Tan: Dropbox built its initial sales team with non-salespeople
“Dropbox was known for this. We would hire a ton of like really smart people that had never done sales and had them do sales.”
Tan: Direct feedback works best when paired with explicit supportive intent
“You know, you want to avoid the uncomfortable conversations, but I actually think the more direct you can be, but also saying this is my intention is to set you up for success. That goes really far, and I think that's a great example of how do you know, deeply…”
Tan: Dropbox growth PMs each generated over $1M ARR from experiments
“As I was leaving Dropbox, the finance team looked at our metrics and saw that each growth PM was bringing over a million in ARR per year just from all the experiments.”
Tan: Webflow split product growth and marketing at the signup line
“Product growth is accountable for all the metrics downstream of signups. Growth marketing is accountable for signups. They're also driving or, like, have goals around CAC, their customer acquisition costs, and these are the different metrics everyone owns.”
Tan: Dropbox's growth team evolved from marketing to sales to product
“Our team at Dropbox moved a ton. Actually, we started marketing. We actually then report into the revenue org with sales, and then we finally moved into product because we realized so much of our revenue was that product growth motion happening in the product …”
Tan: Timebox extra scope to a quarter to prevent burnout
“Also putting, I find that putting a specific timeline, like, hey, I'm going to do this thing for a quarter, but after that we really need to Find somebody else to do it or hand it off is really helpful.”
Tan: Short Loom recordings help employees get leadership visibility asynchronously
“One recent hack I have is Having folks on the team create looms that they can share with different leaders at Webflow. You know, it's hard to sometimes get visibility and get live meeting calendars, but if you create like a five or 10 minute loom on something …”
Tan: Kim Scott workshopped Radical Candor at Dropbox before publishing
“Interestingly enough, Kim Scott was at Dropbox for a short period of time. So when I joined Dropbox, she was actually on my interview panel and we overlapped for three months. And she actually workshopped that book with our team before, or before she published…”
The other half of the tape: Melissa Tan's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 7 times in 2 episodes across the shows. every mention, with the transcript →
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| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| LENNY'S PODCASTLEDGER | Startup Advisor & Angel Investor | 1 | 18 | 0% 0/1 | full record on Lenny's Podcast → |