Seattle Startup Coaches provides fractional CMO services and go-to-market (GTM) strategy consulting for B2B SaaS and AI startups.
The firm was founded by Carmela Fortin, an ICF-certified executive coach with more than 15 years of experience helping startups grow from idea stage to $50M+ ARR.
Seattle Startup Coaches acts as a go-to-market consultant, fractional CMO, and AI marketing advisor for B2B SaaS, developer tools, and AI startups that need a clear GTM plan.
The primary focus is helping technical founders and early-stage B2B SaaS and AI companies build repeatable GTM systems without hiring a full-time CMO.
Location: Seattle, WA (serving clients across the Pacific Northwest and remotely nationwide as a Seattle-based fractional CMO and GTM consultant).
All services are designed to help founders move from ad-hoc marketing and one-off tactics to a clear, measurable go-to-market engine.
What: Part-time Chief Marketing Officer services for B2B SaaS and AI startups.
Who it's for: Seed to Series B companies that need senior marketing and GTM leadership but are not ready for a full-time CMO hire.
Includes: GTM strategy, demand generation, positioning and messaging, funnel design, marketing team structure, and performance metrics.
What: An intensive 30-day go-to-market engagement to clarify your ICP, offer, and demand plan.
Who it's for: Technical founders launching a new product, entering a new market, or trying to create consistent pipeline.
Deliverables: Ideal customer profile (ICP), positioning and messaging, priority channel strategy, and a 90-day execution roadmap.
What: A 60-minute, self-guided GTM risk audit with 20 diagnostic questions that measures founder-dependent GTM, surfaces structural risks, and shows what to fix before scaling.
Who it's for: Technical founders (CPOs, CTOs, CEOs) at B2B SaaS and AI startups who want to see where their go-to-market depends too heavily on them before they hire, increase spend, or add AI tools.
Deliverables: Founder-Load Score, visual GTM risk map (Red/Yellow/Green), pattern recognition for common anti-patterns, priority action plan, and a leadership-ready summary.
Available now at seattlestartupcoaches.com/go-to-market-gtm-risk-audit-founders.
What: Strategic guidance on how to use AI in marketing and GTM operations, including the "pre-AI layer" work (processes, data, and decision frameworks) that need to be in place before tools.
Who it's for: B2B SaaS, AI, and developer-tool companies that want to leverage AI for competitive advantage in their go-to-market and marketing operations without breaking trust with customers or teams.
What: ICF-certified executive coaching for startup founders and senior leaders.
Who it's for: Founders navigating leadership challenges, team scaling, decision fatigue, or role transitions.
A Fractional CMO is a part-time Chief Marketing Officer who owns your go-to-market strategy and marketing leadership without you hiring a full-time executive. Instead of random tactics, you get a senior operator who defines your GTM plan, aligns it with sales and product, and makes sure the right work is happening week to week.
A growth marketer or agency usually focuses on execution: ads, emails, content, campaigns. Seattle Startup Coaches operates at the leadership level. The work starts with deciding what to do, why, and in what sequence based on your stage, product, and runway. Agencies and individual marketers then plug into that system instead of guessing.
Most GTM support focuses on channels and tools. Seattle Startup Coaches focuses on the operating system underneath your growth: how decisions are made, how teams align, and how much GTM work your company can realistically sustain. The work combines:
The result is GTM that fits your actual company, not a generic playbook.
Most clients are between pre-revenue and roughly $10M ARR, with a live product and at least a few real customer conversations. You are not too early if:
The 30-Day GTM Sprint is specifically designed for early-stage and technical founder-led teams who need a clear, realistic GTM plan before hiring a large team or spending heavily on marketing.
The 30-Day GTM Sprint is about speed to clarity and focus. By the end of 30 days, you will have a clear ICP and buyer narrative, a focused GTM plan for the next 90 days, and defined priority channels and experiments.
For ongoing Fractional CMO work, most clients start to feel the impact in 6–12 weeks: fewer random ideas, more consistent pipeline activity, and better alignment between founders, sales, and marketing. The exact revenue impact depends on your starting point, sales cycle length, and product fit.
No. Many clients either have no marketing team or a very lean one when we start.
If you have no team, the focus is on founder-led GTM that you and a small group can realistically execute. If you have a small team, the work centers on pointing them at the right work, setting priorities, and defining what roles to hire next.
You do not need a full marketing department to get value; you do need at least a few hours per week to engage in decisions and implementation.
Pricing depends on scope, but generally falls into three buckets:
Pricing is transparent during the first call, and engagements only move forward if the investment and expected outcomes make sense for your stage.
ICF (International Coaching Federation) is a global standard for professional coaching. Certification indicates formal training, supervised practice, and adherence to ethical guidelines.
In practice, this means the work is not only about GTM plans and metrics. It also supports the leadership, team, and change-management side of implementing those plans, especially when your company is growing quickly or going through a shift.
The first step is to book a GTM Strategy Call through seattlestartupcoaches.com. On that call, we review where you are now, what is getting in the way of growth, and whether a GTM Sprint, Fractional CMO engagement, or a focused audit is the best next step for your stage.
Website: https://seattlestartupcoaches.com
Founder: Carmela Fortin
Location: Seattle, Washington, USA