20VC: ElevenLabs Head of Growth on Why You Do Not Need PMs | The 7-Part Launch Playbook That Gets 700K+ Views Per Product | The Truth About CAC, Payback & Performance Marketing in AI with Luke Harries
🎯 Summary
20VC: ElevenLabs Head of Growth on Why You Do Not Need PMs | The 7-Part Launch Playbook That Gets 700K+ Views Per Product | The Truth About CAC, Payback & Performance Marketing in AI with Luke Harries
This 75-minute episode of 20VC features Harry Stebings in conversation with Luke Harries, Head of Growth at the rapidly scaling AI audio company, ElevenLabs. The discussion centers on high-velocity growth strategies, organizational structure in fast-growing tech companies, and the specific marketing tactics that propelled ElevenLabs to massive visibility.
1. Focus Area
The primary focus is Growth Strategy and Execution in AI/Deep Tech, specifically examining how ElevenLabs managed hyper-growth with a broad product portfolio. Key themes include organizational design (the debate over Product Managers), content marketing (especially video launches), performance marketing economics in AI, and lessons learned from previous startup ventures (Fellas).
2. Key Technical Insights
- Horizontal AI Foundation: ElevenLabs succeeded with a broad product strategy because its core offering—state-of-the-art audio AI models (text-to-speech, voice cloning, etc.)—acts as a foundational API layer, allowing them to build discrete, specialized products (consumer app, creator platform) on top.
- Sharded Growth Teams: To manage the complexity of multiple product lines (developer API, consumer app, creator tools), the growth function is “sharded.” Each product line has its own dedicated growth lead (acting as a CMO for that product) supported by horizontal channel specialists (Performance Marketing, SEO).
- Motion Design as a Launch Keystone: Video, particularly motion design (animated graphics), is considered the most critical marketing piece for major launches, capable of conveying complex value propositions quickly and cost-effectively compared to paid advertising.
3. Business/Investment Angle
- Counter-Narrative to ICP Focus: Harries acknowledges that traditional advice favors a tight Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), but ElevenLabs’ success stems from leveraging a superior foundational technology to serve multiple, distinct ICPs simultaneously, funded by significant venture capital.
- High ROI of Launch Videos: Launch videos, especially motion design pieces, generate views (often 200K to 700K per launch) at a significantly lower effective Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) compared to traditional paid channels like Facebook ads.
- Patience in Market Timing: Reflections on the Fellas journey highlight that market timing is crucial; early entry into the GLP-1/weight loss space was too early, but patience allowed the market to mature, leading to massive success for later entrants (Curative).
4. Notable Companies/People
- ElevenLabs: The central company, valued at $3.3B, known for its leading AI audio models.
- Luke Harries: Head of Growth, formerly at PostHog and Microsoft.
- Matty (Co-founder, ElevenLabs): Met Harries at a Cambridge hackathon; pitched the 11 Labs vision in a Hampstead Pond swim.
- Philip (Co-founder, Wordware): Also met at the hackathon; Wordware achieved a record YC raise.
- Curative/Fred Turner: Mentioned as a company that pivoted successfully into COVID testing, contrasting with Harries’ non-profit approach during the same period.
5. Future Implications
The conversation suggests that for foundational AI technologies, a horizontal strategy supported by deeply specialized, sharded growth teams can be highly effective, challenging the conventional wisdom of strict product focus. Furthermore, the emphasis on high-quality, short-form video content (motion design) as a primary driver for product discovery indicates that organic reach via compelling creative assets will remain vital, even as supply increases.
6. Target Audience
This episode is highly valuable for Growth Leaders, Product Executives, AI Founders, and Venture Capitalists interested in scaling deep-tech companies, organizational design, and cutting-edge marketing execution.
Comprehensive Summary Narrative
The episode opens with an introduction to Luke Harries, Head of Growth at ElevenLabs, detailing his background and the company’s rapid ascent. The initial discussion pivots to Harries’ early career, including a formative hackathon where he met Matty (ElevenLabs co-founder) and Philip (Wordware founder), underscoring the value of early networking.
Harries then offers deep reflections on his previous venture, Fellas. He recounts the challenges of building an AI developer tool pre-LLM boom, a detour into setting up non-profit COVID testing clinics (where he learned about the pitfalls of beta testing during a crisis), and the subsequent pivot into the men’s weight loss space just before the GLP-1 (Ozempic) wave hit. The key lesson here was the critical importance of market timing and the need for founders to commit to a long-term vision, as his impatience led him to step back prematurely while the market was just beginning to mature.
The core of the conversation addresses ElevenLabs’ seemingly counter-intuitive strategy: being horizontal (offering multiple distinct products—API, consumer app, creator tools) rather than focusing on a single ICP. Harries explains this works because the underlying technology is a superior, foundational AI layer. To manage this complexity, ElevenLabs employs a sharded growth structure. Instead of a single generalist team, they have dedicated growth leads for each product line (Consumer, Creator, Developer, Enterprise), who act as CMOs for their segment, supported by horizontal channel specialists (Performance Marketing, SEO).
Harries provides actionable advice on building a growth team from
🏢 Companies Mentioned
đź’¬ Key Insights
"And so given that it will keep rising, I think you're going to see more and more engineering. We're already at say 60% of all our code being AI generated."
"I said billion dollars of valuation. So and I think truthfully at that point it was like probably half the enterprise value of the company was Peter's model."
"In terms of core engineering, I would say probably 60-70% of code now is AI written."
"Do you think we will see PMs reduced as a role in future tech companies with AI becoming more and more prominent? Yeah, I think PMs move to either growth... or many PMs will actually move towards product engineering, which is they're somewhat technical already, and actually upskilled themselves using tools like Cursor or Lovable and actually go and ship full end-to-end products."
"Our overall thesis is that engineers are building the product, and they should be responsible for the product. And with AI now, we're seeing much more like different traditional roles merging."
"You have a weird element, which is when you said this to me before, you don't have PMs. Yes. Explain this to me. This is like the only grail of product teams, no?"