🌊 Deep Dive: The Revenue Reality Check -Why Small Giants Need Different Growth Metrics

The honest truth about profitability, salary sacrifices, and why the numbers that matter most aren’t the ones investors want to see

Two years ago, I left a stable salary to build Mane Hook-Up full-time. I knew it would be financially challenging. I expected some lean months. I anticipated having to be scrappy and resourceful.

What I didn’t expect was that two years later, I’d still be making 30-50% of my previous salary —60% (ish) when you factor in the fractional CMO work I do on the side to make ends meet.

The salary cut has been the most painful part of this journey, and it’s the one thing I don’t think anyone really prepares you for.

But here’s what’s interesting: by traditional start-up metrics, I’m failing. I’m not profitable yet. My revenue isn’t growing at the exponential rates that excites investors. If you looked at my business through a conventional growth lens, you’d probably advise me to pivot or scale faster.

Yet by the metrics that actually matter for building a Small Giant, I’m succeeding. Our community has doubled from 500 to over 1,000 people in a year. We’re hosting events that attendees describe as “still intimate even with 100 people in the room.” Brands that initially passed on partnerships are now reaching out unprompted, asking to collaborate. Our post-event reviews are consistently five stars, with people thanking us for creating spaces where they finally found their tribe.

The disconnect between these two realities taught me something crucial: Small Giants need (some) different metrics than traditional start-ups. When you’re optimising for intimacy, impact, and sustainability rather than scale and exits, the numbers that matter change entirely.

Here’s what I’ve learned about measuring success when you’re choosing to be great instead of big.

The Investor Pressure I Walked Away From

About two years ago, I was having conversations with investors about raising capital for Mane Hook-Up. The pitch meetings went well. They loved the concept. They believed in the team. But every conversation ended the same way: “Come back when you have more traction.”

Their version of “more traction” meant bigger numbers across the board. More users, more revenue, faster growth. They wanted us to branch into market segments we had no interest in serving, just to show the kind of scale that would justify their investment thesis.

I remember sitting in one particularly frustrating meeting where an investor kept pushing: “Why not expand beyond textured hair? Why not serve the broader beauty market? The total addressable market would be so much larger.”

Because that’s not the mission, I thought. Because serving everyone means serving no one exceptionally well. Because the Black hair community deserves businesses built specifically for their needs, not generic solutions retrofitted to include them as an afterthought.

The feedback became tedious and repetitive. Same script, different investor: “Love the concept and the team, come back when there’s more traction or money being made.”

I decided to walk away from those conversations entirely.

It wasn’t a dramatic moment of defiance. It was a quiet realisation that chasing investor approval was pulling my focus away from the people who actually mattered: