30 AppExchange Playbooks CEOs Used to Get Free Traffic

In this article, you will learn how to leverage App Exchanges to acquire new users and grow revenue, complete with real-world examples from top SaaS CEOs. This powerful, yet often overlooked, growth channel has been the secret weapon for many of the fastest-growing software companies. By creating or integrating with an ecosystem of apps, these leaders have built powerful moats, turning their products into indispensable platforms.

You’ll get the 4-step process to launch and dominate App Exchanges, supported by over 40 case studies you can use for inspiration. These examples are from top Founders like Sati Hillyer, who built the Salesforce AppExchange, Wade Foster at Zapier, and Godard Abel at G2, who have collectively generated billions in revenue by mastering this playbook.

The 4-Step Playbook For App Exchanges

1. Step 1: List on a Major App Exchange to Drive Initial Traffic. Instead of trying to build an audience from scratch, go where the audience already is. Major platforms like Salesforce, HubSpot, Slack, and Microsoft have massive user bases actively searching for solutions. Listing your app in their marketplace gives you immediate access to this traffic. Chris at Blackthorn shared that 75% of their leads come from just four key system integrator partners they work with closely in the Salesforce ecosystem, helping them scale past $16 million in ARR.
2. Step 2: Gamify Reviews to Climb the Ranks. Getting listed is only the first step. To stand out, you need to rank highly, and that’s driven by reviews. Create a system to incentivize your users to leave positive reviews. Lucian at Surfer SEO turned his freemium product into a marketing engine by offering more credits in exchange for actions like leaving a review on G2 or the Google Marketplace. This strategy skyrocketed their review count and drove thousands of new clicks.
3. Step 3: Convert Commissions into Equity to Preserve Cash. When working with partners or developers in an exchange, cash commissions can drain your resources, especially when you’re growing fast. A creative tactic is to offer equity or stock options in place of cash commissions. Gil at Metadata, who is now doing almost $15M in ARR, saved over $250,000 in cash by converting sales commissions into stock options, which helped his company survive a near-death cash crunch.
4. Step 4: Build Your Own App Ecosystem. The ultimate goal is to evolve from being a participant in someone else’s marketplace to becoming the platform yourself. This creates a powerful moat where other companies are building on top of your product, making it stickier and more valuable. Augusto Marietti of Kong, now north of $20M in ARR, has fostered a community of over 400 developers who have built 1,400 apps in their marketplace, creating a robust ecosystem that drives their growth.

40+ Examples of App Exchanges Driving Growth

• Zensai’s CEO explained how they get most of their traffic by leveraging “Other People’s Traffic” (OPT) through their listing in the Microsoft App Exchange, a key strategy that helped them grow their learning management system.
• Sati Hillyer, a former Salesforce Leader who built the AppExchange, shared that the platform became a powerhouse for partners, enabling Salesforce to get a percentage of partner revenue, a model that significantly contributed to its multi-billion dollar ecosystem.
• Wade Foster of Zapier, which has surpassed $50 million in ARR, emphasized that their entire growth model is built on having ubiquity in the apps people use, making their platform the essential connection hub for over 1,400 apps.
• Adam Baker from Dealpad highlighted that a key growth stage for SaaS companies doing $3M to $6M is to focus on integrations with major platforms like Salesforce and SAP to expand their reach and move upmarket.
• The CEO of Plobal Apps, doing over $54,000 in MRR, stated their number one growth channel is the Shopify App Store, where being the top-rated app drives 50% of their total traffic.
• Andrew from Organice secured his first five paying customers, now doing $400 in MRR, entirely through the Slack App Exchange by targeting keywords like “org chart” in his app description.
• Dilip Ittyera, CEO of Aikon Labs, leveraged the Slack marketplace to build a waiting list of 10,000 users for their new product by getting featured on Product Hunt, which drove significant initial traction before their paid launch.
• GetAccept’s CEO, Samir Smilic, whose company hit $1.7M in ARR, explained that partnerships with CRM platforms like HubSpot and Pipedrive are critical lead sources, driving engagement through co-marketing efforts like webinars and newsletters.
• The CEO of SmartSheet, now at an $80 million annual run rate, credits partner marketplaces like the Office 365 ecosystem and the G Suite Marketplace as key distribution channels that fuel their growth.
• Andre Podoracki of Widgetic, which helps companies build their own app exchanges, shared that his company makes about $8,000 per month by acting as a developer and distributing their own apps on the Shopify, Weebly, and Wix app stores.
• Godard Abel, founder of G2, explained that a key part of his company’s strategy, which became a unicorn, is partnering with giants. G2 now powers reviews for the AWS, Microsoft Azure, and IBM Red Hat cloud marketplaces.
• Stefan Smulders of Expandi, which hit $7M in ARR, used tools to scrape competitor Facebook groups, convert members to LinkedIn profiles, and then ran targeted outreach campaigns to acquire his first crucial users who were already familiar with his niche.
• Manny Medina of Outreach.io, which does well over $10M per quarter, explained that their expansion playbook involves getting a small team within a large organization using the product and then using viral, internal loops to expand across the entire company.
• The marketing lead at Sprinto detailed a tactic of piggybacking on high-authority websites that already ranked for their target keywords by getting their tool injected into existing content pieces, which drove immediate traffic and trust.
• Todd Olson of Pendo, which grew to over $1.2M in MRR, explained their primary expansion model is landing on a single product within a large enterprise and then expanding to other product lines within the same company.
• Kyle Poyar from OpenView shared data that Cloud Marketplaces are a key discovery channel for product-led growth companies, contributing to their user acquisition alongside organic search and viral loops.
• The CEO of GrowSumo, a marketplace for influencer programs, explained that big companies like Intuit use their platform, and then the 500+ apps that integrate with Intuit also want to join GrowSumo to create a shared partner network, driving a powerful network effect.
• Showpad’s co-founder, whose company passed $20M in ARR, mentioned that while they are listed on the Salesforce AppExchange, their main growth comes from direct sales, using integrations as a value-add rather than a primary acquisition channel.
• Brandon Bruce of Cirrus Insight, which passed $1M in MRR, noted that Salesforce has tightened up its AppExchange, making it more “pay-to-play,” which has shifted their acquisition focus towards word-of-mouth and other channels.
• The CEO of BlogVault acquired 200,000 signups primarily from the WordPress App Exchange, demonstrating the massive potential of a single, well-optimized marketplace listing.
• The founder of Blackthorn, Chris Federspiel, explained his company, doing over $15M in ARR, relies heavily on the Salesforce App Exchange and system integrator partners to drive growth, a strategy that proved more effective than building numerous direct partnerships.
• Chris from Blackthorn, who bootstrapped to over $16.5M ARR, shared that his most successful partnership is a revenue share with Stripe, which brings in over $1M per year by processing payments that originate from his app.
• Ashish Agarwal of AppBroda explained that his company, which helps developers monetize, has a key partnership with Google and is building others with networks like IronSource and AppLovin, as helping their end customers optimize makes the marketplaces more money.
• Carter Olive, founder of StayBusy.ca, which did $2.7M in painting volume, leverages Facebook groups to find contractors for his home services marketplace by building relationships with group admins and providing value.
• Chris at Blackthorn detailed his acquisition of Texty, an SMS app on the AppExchange with $550k ARR. He funded the $3.25M purchase (a 6x multiple) with $1.2M in debt, preserving equity while adding a key product to his portfolio.
• Raul at Instantly.ai, which hit $200k MRR in just 9 months, used a launch on AppSumo to get his initial word-of-mouth traction and build his initial user base before transitioning off the lifetime deal model.
• Julian from Mergify, now at $110k MRR, gets very few customers from the official GitHub Marketplace listing, finding that developers discover his tool through organic search for terms like “merge queue for GitHub” instead.
• The founder of Expandi used PhantomBuster to scrape competitor Facebook groups, found those users on LinkedIn, and then ran targeted campaigns inviting them to test his new, safer tool, booking 40+ appointments per week in the early days.
• Paul Lynch of Assembla, which grew 60% year-over-year, partners with marketplaces like the AWS Marketplace in San Francisco to host secure, geo-specific instances for their enterprise source code management solution.
• Amin Yazdani from Craver noted that while enterprise literature focuses on channels like cold email, for his SMB restaurant clients, he had to adapt and found that cold calling the physical restaurant locations was his most effective outbound channel.
• Adam Broadway’s company, Platform OS, helped Intel build their own version of “Facebook for developers,” a private community for their ecosystem, demonstrating the power of creating a branded, owned marketplace. His platform is now doing $150k in MRR.
• Sean Ellis of GrowthHackers.com shared that Eventbrite’s growth comes from its natural viral loop where event attendees are exposed to the platform and then become event organizers themselves, creating a self-sustaining ecosystem.
• The CEO of Kahuna, a customer engagement platform for marketplaces that has raised $50M, noted that their international growth is fueled by helping new companies in every country build their own local version of Zillow, Airbnb, or Uber.
• Amit BenDov of Gong.io, which hit over $1M in ARR in its first year, got his initial traction by calling 50 VPs of Sales he knew to validate his idea before building the product and then brought on 12 of them as beta customers.
• John Brakey of Promys, doing over $4.5M in ARR, leverages a highly targeted list of 4,000 prospects that he knows are a perfect fit, using a patient, long-term marketing cycle to win them over when their existing solutions fail.
• Aneto Okonkwo of Chatdesk described a “foot in the door” approach, starting clients on a small, low-cost social media moderation plan and then expanding the relationship to include email support, call deflection, and SMS, tripling ARR through upsells.
• The team at Chatdesk uses a multi-pronged integration strategy, building deep integrations with common platforms like Facebook, but also being first-to-market with cutting-edge integrations for platforms like TikTok to be perceived as innovative.
• Jake Moore of Superwall, a tool for building mobile app paywalls doing $3.6M in ARR, has built an internal team that has created over 4,000 custom paywalls, using that knowledge to offer a high-touch “growth plan” for his largest customers.
• Zach Hedges from AimiSocial revealed that his first $25k in MRR came almost entirely from affiliates, using a two-tier program where partners earned 30% on tier one and 10% on tier two, leveraging a community he built in a Facebook group.
• Luc Swannack of GrowSumo, whose platform helps B2B SaaS companies grow affiliate programs, explained that big partners like Intuit use their tool, which in turn attracts all of the apps that integrate with Intuit to also join their platform, creating a powerful network effect.
• Sean Ellis explained that at LogMeIn, which IPO’d and is now a $5 billion company, 80% of users came from word-of-mouth, which was unlocked after they optimized their activation funnel, proving that a valuable product experience is the foundation for any viral growth.
• Raj Aggarwal of Localytics, a mobile engagement platform that hit $30M in ARR, moved his company upmarket by discontinuing a $99/month plan and focusing on enterprise deals, finding that the revenue gained from upselling 25% of the lower-tier customers more than offset the 75% that churned.

Conclusion

You have just learned how the world’s top SaaS founders utilize App Exchanges to generate millions in revenue and acquire thousands of new users. The common thread is clear: instead of fighting for attention in crowded channels, they go where their customers already are and leverage existing ecosystems. Whether it’s listing on a major marketplace, getting partners to resell, or building your own platform, this strategy is a powerful engine for sustainable growth. To get your own metrics and see how you stack up, start tracking your SaaS data for free at Founderpath.com.

Founderpath invests in ambitious founders looking to grow fast. Click here to submit a capital request