Finance Startup Succeeds Through Strategic Partner Positioning

After helping Sumo Logic go public with marketing programs generating 20% of ARR, I made a counterintuitive move - leaving the excitement of public company success to join OpStart, a finance-as-a-service startup most people hadn't heard of. Everyone questioned why I'd trade proven growth engines for back-office accounting.

The bold bet was positioning OpStart beyond traditional bookkeeping into strategic finance partnership. While competitors sold basic accounting services, we built our entire go-to-market around being growth-focused financial partners who remove mental load from founders. This meant completely restructuring how we talked about ourselves - from "we do your books" to "we're your finance team."

The risk paid off because we identified what founders actually need - not just compliance, but confidence in their numbers for investor conversations. Kate Beard from Wendy perfectly captured this: "The mental load OpStart has taken off our plates is immense, plus it's up-leveled our financial presentations for investors."

The change worked because we solved the real problem - founders were drowning in financial complexity when they should focus on customers, product, and team. By positioning as strategic partners rather than service providers, we became essential to growth instead of just necessary for compliance.

Maurina Venturelli, Head of GTM, OpStart