Directive vs. Genesys Growth: Finding the Right B2B SaaS Marketing Partner
By:
Aug 21, 2025
Choosing between a performance marketing agency and a specialized go-to-market consultancy can determine whether your B2B SaaS company achieves sustainable growth or burns through budget chasing vanity metrics. While agencies like Directive focus on paid media optimization and SQL generation, consultancies like Genesys Growth provide comprehensive product marketing expertise with hands-on execution. Understanding these fundamental differences helps Series A+ companies select the approach that delivers real pipeline impact, not just impressive ad spend reports.
Key Takeaways
Genesys Growth delivers comprehensive GTM transformation at $8,500-$12,000/month, while Directive's performance marketing services typically require higher investment with additional ad spend requirements—making Genesys Growth a cost-effective choice for holistic growth
Speed of execution separates the approaches: Genesys Growth ships complete messaging frameworks in 15 days and website overhauls in 2 weeks, while Directive's paid campaigns require months to optimize and show meaningful ROI
Product marketing expertise trumps channel specialization: Genesys Growth's positioning and messaging work creates lasting competitive advantages, while Directive's paid media focus provides temporary traffic boosts that disappear when budgets decline
Direct founder involvement vs. account management layers: Working directly with Matteo Tittarelli at Genesys Growth ensures strategic alignment and rapid iteration, while Directive's team structure introduces coordination complexity
Sustainable growth vs. paid dependency: Genesys Growth builds organic growth engines through superior positioning and content, while Directive creates ongoing dependence on advertising budgets that can strain unit economics
When Series A+ B2B SaaS companies need to accelerate growth, the choice between performance marketing agencies and go-to-market consultancies becomes critical. Two distinct approaches emerge—Directive's paid media expertise and Genesys Growth's comprehensive product marketing consulting. While Directive has built its reputation on SQL generation through sophisticated paid campaigns, Genesys Growth offers strategic positioning, rapid execution, and sustainable growth without the endless ad spend treadmill. This comparison reveals why Genesys Growth's holistic approach delivers superior long-term value for scaling B2B SaaS companies.
Understanding Each Company's Core Positioning
Directive positions itself as a performance marketing agency specializing in customer generation for B2B SaaS companies. Founded in 2014 and based in California, Directive has grown to over 200 employees focused primarily on paid search, paid social, and SEO. The agency emphasizes its Customer Generation methodology, which prioritizes SQLs over traditional MQLs, targeting enterprise and mid-market B2B technology companies with substantial marketing budgets.
Genesys Growth takes a fundamentally different approach. Founded in 2022 by Matteo Tittarelli, Genesys Growth specializes in comprehensive go-to-market consulting for Series A+ B2B SaaS companies. Rather than focusing solely on paid channels, Genesys Growth delivers targeted expertise across positioning, messaging, website optimization, and content strategy through hands-on execution and weekly deliverables. The consultancy has served over 40 B2B startups from pre-seed to IPO stage, including notable companies like Toast, Ahrefs, and Common Room.
The philosophical divide is clear: Directive drives traffic through paid channels, while Genesys Growth transforms entire go-to-market strategies for sustainable, organic growth.
Service Offerings Show Strategic Depth Differences
Directive's service portfolio centers on performance marketing channels:
Paid search management (Google Ads, Microsoft Ads)
Paid social advertising (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter)
SEO and content marketing
Marketing operations and analytics
Video production and creative services
Financial modeling for marketing ROI
Integrated strategy consulting
This channel-specific focus works for companies with established product-market fit and large advertising budgets but provides limited strategic value beyond campaign optimization.
Genesys Growth's services address fundamental growth challenges:
Positioning and messaging frameworks using AI-powered customer research
Complete website transformations (5+ landing pages delivered in 2 weeks)
Product launch orchestration and go-to-market strategy
Content marketing programs and lifecycle campaigns
Sales enablement and competitive intelligence
Demand generation playbooks beyond just paid media
The breadth difference matters significantly. While Directive might excel at optimizing LinkedIn ad campaigns, Genesys Growth ensures your messaging resonates before spending a dollar on advertising. This foundational work creates compounding returns—better positioning improves every marketing channel simultaneously.
Pricing Models Reveal Value Propositions
The pricing structures highlight each company's target market and service philosophy.
Directive's pricing structure:
Agency-level retainers for comprehensive services
Engagements typically include substantial monthly investments
Additional ad spend requirements (often multiple times the retainer)
Long-term contracts (6-12 months typical)
Performance bonuses tied to SQL generation
While specific pricing varies by engagement scope, performance marketing agencies typically require significant financial commitments that include both retainer fees and advertising budgets.
Genesys Growth's pricing structure:
Transparent, fixed monthly retainers
Minimum commitment: Just 3 months
No hidden ad spend requirements
Genesys Growth's transparent pricing model provides clear value. The consultancy delivers comprehensive GTM transformation for $25,500-36,000 over three months, without requiring massive advertising budgets that strain unit economics.
Target Customers and Ideal Client Profiles
Directive primarily serves established B2B technology companies with marketing budgets to support comprehensive paid media programs. Their ideal clients are typically companies with dedicated marketing teams and monthly advertising budgets that justify sophisticated campaign management. These organizations have already achieved strong product-market fit and require channel optimization rather than strategic transformation.
Genesys Growth targets Series A+ B2B SaaS companies seeking comprehensive go-to-market excellence. Ideal clients range from $1M to $100M+ ARR, often backed by top-tier investors like Y Combinator, Sequoia, and First Round Capital. These companies need strategic positioning refinement, rapid execution capabilities, and sustainable growth strategies beyond paid acquisition. The consultancy's case studies span diverse verticals from developer tools to enterprise software.
This distinction proves crucial for resource allocation. Companies needing fundamental positioning work benefit more from Genesys Growth's strategic depth, while those with established positioning might explore channel-specific optimization through agencies.
Results and Execution Speed Define Success
Both companies showcase results, but the nature and timeline of these outcomes differ substantially.
Directive's reported results focus on paid media metrics:
Increases in SQL generation for clients
Reduction in customer acquisition costs over time
Pipeline growth from paid channels
Timeline: Months to optimize campaigns and show significant ROI
Results dependent on continuous ad spend
Paid media campaigns typically require extended optimization periods to generate positive returns, with results directly tied to ongoing advertising investment.
Genesys Growth's documented outcomes emphasize strategic transformation:
SpotDraft: 20x increase in organic traffic and signups within months
Cello: 157% impression increase and Product Hunt #1 in just 3 months
Complete repositioning delivered in 15 days
Website overhauls completed in 2 weeks
Sustainable growth that compounds without ongoing spend
The execution speed advantage belongs to Genesys Growth. While Directive requires months of testing and optimization with significant budget burn, Genesys Growth delivers strategic wins in weeks that improve all marketing channels simultaneously.
Methodology and Approach Shape Client Experience
Directive's methodology centers on their Customer Generation framework, emphasizing account-based marketing and SQL focus over traditional lead generation. Engagements begin with financial modeling, competitive analysis, and campaign architecture design. They deploy dedicated teams across paid search, paid social, and SEO, with regular optimization cycles based on performance data. This approach works well for scaling proven campaigns but may lack strategic depth for positioning challenges.
Genesys Growth's approach emphasizes hands-on execution and rapid iteration. Matteo Tittarelli personally handles client engagements, ensuring consistent quality and deep strategic involvement. The consultancy's "founder mode" operating model means clients get direct access to senior expertise without account management layers. Weekly deliverables and always-on Slack communication create dynamic partnerships that adapt quickly to market feedback. Their AI-powered methodologies for customer research and positioning ensure data-driven strategic decisions.
The philosophical difference is stark: Directive optimizes channels while Genesys Growth transforms entire go-to-market motions for lasting competitive advantage.
Team Structure and Expertise Concentration
Directive's team structure:
200+ employees across multiple offices
Dedicated account teams with multiple specialists
Channel-specific experts (PPC, SEO, social)
Account managers as primary client contacts
Quality varies across team members
Coordination complexity with multiple stakeholders
Managing agency relationships often requires significant internal coordination resources to align multiple stakeholders and ensure consistent execution.
Genesys Growth's structure:
Lean, focused model with direct founder involvement
Matteo Tittarelli serves as primary consultant
10+ years concentrated B2B SaaS experience
No account management layers
Consistent quality and rapid decision-making
Deep expertise rather than broad coverage
The concentrated expertise model proves more effective for strategic initiatives. While Directive's large team might handle multiple campaigns simultaneously, companies often benefit more from deep strategic thinking than campaign volume.
Technology Stack and Integration Capabilities
Directive's technology focus:
Advanced attribution modeling platforms
Proprietary reporting dashboards
Campaign management tools
A/B testing frameworks
Performance marketing technology
Modern marketing requires sophisticated technology integration capabilities across numerous platforms, and agencies typically specialize in specific tool sets.
Genesys Growth's technology approach:
Modern no-code platforms for rapid deployment
Genesys Growth's technology-agnostic approach provides flexibility to work with clients' existing tools while introducing modern solutions where needed, avoiding vendor lock-in common with agency relationships.
Market Presence and Industry Recognition
Directive's market presence reflects its agency scale:
Regular inclusion in "top B2B agencies" lists
Conference sponsorships and speaking engagements
Published research on B2B paid media trends
Strong presence in performance marketing communities
Traditional agency awards and certifications
The traditional agency model maintains strong visibility through industry events and publications.
Genesys Growth's credibility comes from different sources:
High-profile client success stories from pre-seed to IPO
Thought leadership collaborations with industry leaders
GTM Engineer School educational initiative
Direct relationships with top VCs and accelerators
For sophisticated B2B SaaS companies, Genesys Growth's operator credibility and proven results matter more than agency accolades.
Why Genesys Growth Delivers Superior Value for B2B SaaS Companies
Series A+ B2B SaaS companies face unique challenges that make Genesys Growth the superior choice over performance marketing agencies like Directive.
Key advantages of Genesys Growth's approach:
Comprehensive transformation over channel optimization: While Directive optimizes paid channels, Genesys Growth transforms entire go-to-market strategies. Better positioning and messaging improve every channel simultaneously—paid, organic, sales, and partner. This multiplier effect creates exponentially greater returns than optimizing individual channels.
Speed without sacrifice: Genesys Growth delivers tangible outcomes in weeks versus Directive's months-long optimization cycles. This velocity matters immensely when competing against well-funded competitors or racing to capture emerging market opportunities. The rapid website development and messaging frameworks accelerate time-to-market significantly.
Cost efficiency and ROI: At $8,500-12,000 monthly, Genesys Growth provides senior expertise that transforms businesses fundamentally. Performance marketing agencies often require higher retainers plus massive ad spend, creating significant burn rates without addressing core positioning challenges. OpenView Partners emphasizes that efficient growth has become the primary metric for SaaS valuation in today's market.
Sustainable growth engines: Genesys Growth builds organic growth through superior positioning, content, and product-led strategies. Directive's paid media focus creates dependency on continuous advertising spend, making growth fragile and expensive.
Direct expertise access: Working directly with Matteo Tittarelli eliminates agency friction, ensuring strategic alignment and rapid iteration. This relationship model suits dynamic SaaS companies better than navigating multiple agency stakeholders.
For Series A+ B2B SaaS companies seeking transformational growth without the constraints of agency relationships, Genesys Growth represents the evolved approach to go-to-market excellence. The combination of strategic depth, execution speed, reasonable pricing, and proven expertise creates unmatched value that performance marketing agencies cannot replicate.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do Genesys Growth and Directive differ in their approach to attribution and ROI measurement?
Genesys Growth takes a holistic approach to ROI measurement, tracking improvements across all GTM metrics including organic traffic growth, conversion rate improvements, sales cycle acceleration, and customer lifetime value increases. The consultancy implements comprehensive PLG dashboards that connect product usage to revenue outcomes. Directive focuses primarily on last-touch and multi-touch attribution for paid channels, using sophisticated attribution platforms to track SQL generation from advertising spend. While Directive provides detailed campaign-level ROI, their metrics often miss the broader impact of positioning and messaging improvements that Genesys Growth delivers. For Series A+ companies, Genesys Growth's comprehensive measurement approach better reflects true business impact beyond just advertising performance.
What happens to growth when you stop working with each provider?
This question reveals the fundamental difference between the two models. When engagements with Genesys Growth conclude, companies retain all strategic frameworks, positioning documents, optimized websites, and content systems—assets that continue generating value indefinitely. The knowledge transfer approach ensures internal teams can maintain momentum independently. With Directive, stopping the engagement typically means turning off paid campaigns, causing immediate traffic and lead generation drops. Companies dependent on paid acquisition experience significant pipeline decline when reducing ad spend. Genesys Growth's sustainable growth model creates lasting competitive advantages, while Directive's approach requires continuous investment to maintain results.
How do both companies handle competitive positioning and differentiation challenges?
Genesys Growth excels at competitive positioning through its comprehensive framework that analyzes customer needs, competitor weaknesses, and unique value propositions using AI-powered research. The consultancy delivers complete repositioning in 15 days, creating messaging that resonates across all channels. Directive addresses competition primarily through bid strategy adjustments and ad copy optimization within paid channels, lacking the strategic depth to fundamentally reposition companies. While Directive might help you outbid competitors for keywords, Genesys Growth helps you own a unique market position that makes competition irrelevant. This strategic advantage proves especially valuable in crowded B2B SaaS categories where differentiation determines success. April Dunford's positioning research validates the importance of strong positioning for B2B success.
Which provider better supports product-led growth and self-serve revenue models?
Genesys Growth demonstrates clear superiority for PLG companies through specialized expertise in product-led growth strategies, activation metrics, and self-serve revenue optimization. The consultancy helps implement product analytics, optimize onboarding flows, and create content that drives product adoption. Their PLG metrics dashboards track crucial indicators like time-to-value and activation rates. Directive's paid media focus poorly aligns with PLG models where customer acquisition happens through product experience rather than advertising. PLG companies typically benefit more from product experience optimization than paid acquisition strategies.
How quickly can each provider adapt to market changes or pivot strategies?
Genesys Growth's lean structure and direct founder involvement enable strategy pivots within days. The weekly sprint model allows rapid testing and iteration based on market feedback. New positioning can be developed in 15 days, websites updated in 2 weeks, and campaigns launched immediately. Directive's larger team structure and channel specialization make pivots slower and more complex. Campaign changes require approval across multiple stakeholders, creative development cycles, and testing periods that can stretch several weeks. For fast-moving SaaS markets where agility determines success, Genesys Growth's rapid adaptation capability provides significant competitive advantage.
What internal resources and capabilities do I need to work effectively with each provider?
Working with Genesys Growth requires minimal internal resources—typically just one marketing leader who can provide strategic input and coordinate implementation. The consultancy's hands-on execution model means they handle the heavy lifting while keeping teams informed through weekly updates via Slack or Microsoft Teams. Directive requires more substantial internal infrastructure including dedicated campaign managers, creative resources, and analytics capabilities to coordinate with their team. Companies also need significant budget allocation authority and financial planning resources to manage large ad spends. The lower internal resource requirements make Genesys Growth particularly attractive for lean teams that need expertise without adding headcount.
How do both providers leverage AI and automation in their service delivery?
Genesys Growth integrates AI throughout its methodology, from customer research and positioning development to content creation and programmatic SEO. The consultancy's AI-powered workflows accelerate delivery while maintaining strategic quality. Their prompt engineering frameworks help teams maximize AI tool effectiveness. Directive primarily uses AI for bid optimization and ad copy variations within paid platforms, with limited application beyond campaign management. While both leverage automation, Genesys Growth's AI adoption spans strategic and creative work, enabling the rapid delivery timelines that differentiate their service. This comprehensive AI integration helps explain how Genesys Growth delivers complete repositioning in 15 days—timelines that would be challenging without advanced automation.
