Entering the US market: advice from founders of Perceptis, Leaping AI, and Call2action.ai

Arcady Telegin, founder Leaping AI

In America, B2B and Sales Outreach are much more effective, and businesses value rapid iteration. Relationships with them and with contractors are much more utilitarian. If they don't like something, they leave for competitors.

If it's normal in Europe for customers to wait several days for your response, in America responsiveness and customer orientation are valued.

Also, if you've signed a contract, that client is unlikely to leave. This isn't really done here, and many more people come in inbound through marketing.

Yersultan Jusakinov, founder and CEO Call2action.ai

Business in the US differs from Kazakhstan. For example, 80% of communication here is done via email, and messengers are hardly used. Digital advertising costs three times more, and the cost per lead can reach $50-100 due to high competition. At the same time, we cannot set prices higher than competitors to remain competitive.

The biggest challenge is finding the first customers. In the early stages, we sent over 500 emails and held about 30 meetings before closing our first deals. It was difficult, but it helped build trust and understand market needs.

Advice for beginners: test hypotheses quickly. Even if something doesn't work, it's already a valuable signal from the market. Finding your Product Market Fit is a process, and mistakes only bring you closer to your goal. And most importantly: be patient and don't be afraid to adapt.

Yersultan Sapar, founder Perceptis

We immediately started in the American market, but with a completely different idea. We quickly realized that we needed to test hypotheses and communicate with customers more than creating lots of features.

In fact, even now, despite our growth, every day we ask ourselves: "What exactly is the most important thing for our users?" This helps us stay focused.