Five net new case studies for a GPU marketplace moving upmarket

Business context

Vast.ai is a $30M ARR peer-to-peer GPU rental marketplace that grew through SEO and product-led growth, preparing to move upmarket into enterprise.

The decision or challenge

Because privacy is core to the product, the company had almost no customer data and had never formally interviewed its customers. Before the upmarket move it needed proof, and a real understanding of who its best customers are.

My mandate

Product marketing consultant working with B2B Catalyst, running the company's first formal customer research program.

What I did

• Conducted 15 in-depth customer interviews covering experience, pain points, competitive comparisons, and unmet needs.
• Synthesized the conversations into personas, an ICP, and five distinct customer types with different buying patterns.
• Turned the interviews into five net new case studies, and redesigned the sales materials around what actually resonated.
• Built a customer lifecycle marketing plan targeting the moments that drive onboarding, activation, upsell, and retention.
• Redesigned the website and inbound funnel so enterprise needs route to sales instead of the self-serve motion, and pitched a new partnership play: GPU credits for VC and PE firms to offer their portfolio companies.

What changed

The case studies gave Vast customer proof it had never had, and landing page views rose 201% quarter over quarter after they launched. The inbound optimization lifted lead submissions 333%. The funnel redesign lifted inbound lead flow 40% within two months, and the research surfaced product feedback that shaped the enterprise roadmap, from SLA needs to billing.

What remained after I left

The ICP and segmentation, five case studies working in the sales motion, the lifecycle framework, and a repeatable interview approach the team can run again. This engagement is the shape of my flagship voice-of-customer program: interviews in, growth out.