SaaStr

OCTOBER 31, 2024

Here’s what I see most often, the Top 6 Mistakes First Time SaaS Founders Make: Incomplete understanding of business model, and how it will scale. But they also make mistakes we tend not to make with experience.

Scale 312

Scale SaaS Social Media Business Model 312

SaaStr

DECEMBER 27, 2024

Existing distribution channels: While startups are racing to build distribution, incumbents already have it However, the business model disruption around AI pricing remains a challenge for larger players to navigate.

AI 290

AI Marketing SaaS Interviewing 290

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 21, 2025

While Dreamforce is larger overall, SaaStr Annual is more specifically focused on the SaaS business model and community, rather than being tied to a specific vendor’s ecosystem.

Software 246

Software Scale Venture Capital SaaS 246

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 2, 2025

Companies need to: Ensure secure data handling Maintain clean data for model training Integrate effectively across multiple systems Enable real-time data access where needed Evolution of Business Models The integration of AI is driving changes in how vertical software companies approach pricing and business models: Pricing Strategies Traditional subscription-based (..)

AI 222

AI Technical Review Artificial Intelligence Systems Review 222

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 10, 2025

25x’d Revenue and Crossed $100M ARR Apollo.io, an all-in-one go-to-market platform, underwent a significant transformation in its business model that led to remarkable growth. From Sales-Led to Product-Led: How Apollo.io

Scale 162

Scale Scaling Outsourced Development Sales 162

TechEmpower SaaS

JULY 31, 2023

Proving your Business Model Works - Build, Define, and Review But how do you prove your numbers? Then use what you’ve learned in this blog post to decide if the numbers validate your business model, or if you need to rethink your approach. Conclusion Startup metrics are an invaluable tool for founders and innovators.

Metrics 390

Metrics Startup Scale New CTO 390

SaaStr

OCTOBER 23, 2024

From day one, they considered having a viable business model, so they didn’t wait to build it. When René’s dad had a payroll company, the rule of thumb was always one year’s worth of revenue, four quarters, because a customer lasted a year. Bill does six quarters because customers stay on the platform for more than a year.

SMB 312

SMB Payment Services Payments Payment Methods 312

SaaStr

MARCH 1, 2025

He’s known for his systems-thinking approach to company building and has helped scale multiple businesses from zero to public company status. This specific threshold serves as a critical signal that your business model has legs.

Scale 188

Scale Systems Review Scaling Leadership 188

SaaStr

JANUARY 15, 2025

But the only way it can happen if you train your sales team to be specialists in the specific business models that they’re selling to. Churn is naturally higher, so you have to trim off a few days of the sales cycle to allow AEs to more easily hit quota. ” 8.

Scale 278

Scale Sales Hiring SaaS Payments Sales 278

SaaStr

OCTOBER 30, 2024

That’s a reality, but it forces you to focus on business models where you always win. And that means that 99 percent of startups can’t even raise venture capital. Bootstrapping takes longer on average. 11 If you are offered a second check, how picky should you be?

Venture Capital 316

Venture Capital Software Review Investment Startup 316

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 26, 2025

It’s a business model, an organizational framework, and ultimately, a path to building a more efficient, customer-centric company. It’s better to do a few things extraordinarily well than to do everything mediocrely.

Enterprise readiness 144

Enterprise readiness Enterprise compliance Acquisition 144

SaaStr

MAY 25, 2022

The Sword: a product-led growth business. Every successful business you admire—Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, et al.—was was built on a solid, profitable business model. Its economic model needed to capture the entire market, which leads to the second piece of the Conan Economics puzzle. Nothing else matters.

Scale 311

Scale Marketplace as a Service Advertising Business Model 311

The Daily Egg

NOVEMBER 15, 2022

Ecommerce is one of the most attractive business models nowadays. The post 8 Examples of Ecommerce Business Ideas appeared first on The Daily Egg. It is easy to get started, and the possibilities for profit are.

Business 311

Business Business Model 311

The Daily Egg

APRIL 28, 2020

Any funnel, any business model, any marketing channel. If you want to double or triple your conversion rates over the next 9 months, A/B testing is the foolproof way to do it. You could easily double your customer counts within the next year. All without having to increase your marketing spend or get more traffic. […].

Business Model 317

Business Model Marketing Business 317

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 20, 2024

What do they think the key drivers of the business will be? Does the model even make sense? Do they really understand their business model? Of course any early-stage (or even late-stage) model is “wrong”. How are they thinking about hiring? How are they thinking about unit economics?

Investment 308

Investment Sales Hiring Business Model Sales 308

The Daily Egg

AUGUST 4, 2022

By now, chances are you’ve heard of dropshipping, the ecommerce business model that allows entrepreneurs to run their businesses without ever carrying. The post The Complete Guide to AliExpress Dropshipping appeared first on The Daily Egg.

Business Model 59

Business Model Business 59

SaaStr

APRIL 19, 2024

You Need A Business Model with Economies of Scale As you’re trying to reverse engineer whether your business model makes sense, you have to look at your business model. Certain business models have economies of scale, and some don’t. So, what does it take to get to a $100M outcome?

Engineering 305

Engineering Business Model Pricing Scaling 305

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 23, 2024

But while the brand and market penetration is strong, the business model is challenging. So Toast is one of the most iconic B2B leaders out there. We’ve all used Toast 10s or 100s of times by now. It still loses money on the hardware, and the payments side is fairly low margin (28% or less).

Scale 311

Scale Payment Solutions Payments Sales 311

SaaStr

MARCH 18, 2025

The bar has risen significantly from the “growth at all costs” mindset of 2021-2022. Final Thoughts The AI space is well-funded but still maturing.

Technical Review 189

Technical Review Artificial Intelligence AI Marketplace as a Service 189

SaaStr

JANUARY 12, 2021

Because the (maybe semi-sad) thing for VCs is, only Unicorns make the business model work : Say you have a $200m VC fund (not that large, but basically our current fund, as an example). For VCs that manage a fund any bigger than $150m or so though (which is relatively small for a VC) — there really is only one way.

Venture Capital 363

Venture Capital Acquisition Business Model Investment 363

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 24, 2024

Which is the bar to IPO today and for VCs to make enough money for their business model to work. But if you run that math out — that’s what it takes to compound to IPO in 10-12 years, to get to $200m ARR growing 50% or more. VCs need true unicorn exits — just to survive.

Social Media 315

Social Media Business Model B2B SaaS 315

SaaStr

AUGUST 26, 2024

Plus, three of the closing sessions will be open to the broader audience of Annual this year: Customer Success in Different Business Models with Slack, Mulesoft, and OpenAI : In this session , these three CS leaders will discuss how customer success strategies differ across various business models.

Benchmarks 299

Benchmarks Finance Business Model Forecasting 299

SaaStr

JULY 4, 2024

What’s wrong with our business model? Dear SaaStr: We Are Growing Too Fast to Handle the Workload, but We Can’t Afford to Hire New Employees. We’ve all been there. Almost all of us, at least.

Business Model 303

Business Model Engineering Scaling Branding 303

Predictable Revenue

OCTOBER 1, 2020

Deep dive into the mistake that turned into a business model that gets George McGehrin's clients to pay him to market to them, and building a model that is recession-proof. The post How George McGehrin gets his clients to pay HIM to market to them appeared first on Predictable Revenue.

Marketing 277

Marketing Business Model Revenue Business 277

SaaStr

OCTOBER 12, 2022

This is a good business model! Revenue per employee is the ultimate summary of how efficient a business model is. I’m guessing a bit here on actual ARR at the moment, but in any event, $350,000 in revenue per employee is pretty efficient. Most public SaaS companies aim to get above $250,000. 2,000 plug-ins.

Cloud 61

Cloud Business Model Engineering Acquisition 61

Tom Tunguz

JANUARY 22, 2023

Longer-term contracts & steadier enterprise buyers help smooth shocks for B2B companies. The main challenges facing B2B startups today are decreases in seat counts as their customers downsize & slower sales cycles which creates volatility in bookings , which has caused more layoffs than an anytime in the last four years.

B2C 319

B2C B2B Headcount Business Model 319

SaaStr

JUNE 13, 2021

. #2 Category-defining products require new business models. Businesses often build something powerful but don’t create the proper value package, and it fails in the market. When you’re bringing an innovative product to fruition, it requires a business model that’s built for it specifically.

Scale 253

Scale Scaling Business Model Company Culture 253

SaaStr

AUGUST 10, 2022

This is the secret sauce to Atlassian’s business model. And come join Atlassian’s CRO LIVE at 2022 SaaStr Annual on Sep 13-15 sharing how they scale their unique business model! 8,800 employees, so an impressive ~$350,000 in revenue per employee. And its doubling down on being hybrid and distributed. #4.

Scale 289

Scale Headcount Cloud Forecasting 289

Tom Tunguz

FEBRUARY 26, 2025

The traditional SaaS business model of annual prepaid contracts based on seats faces challenges when a human is no longer operating the software. 3x as productive as humans, software pricing will need to evolve.

SaaS Payments 279

SaaS Payments Pricing Strategy Scale 279

SaaStr

OCTOBER 16, 2022

Why The Business Model of Venture Capital is Really, Really Hard. Conan Economics, or How to Crush Your Enemies with Expensify CEO David Barrett. CEO Systems: 5 Lessons Learned from Scaling at Every Growth Phase with HashiCorp CEO Dave McJannet. appeared first on SaaStr.

Venture Capital 312

Venture Capital Business Model B2B Startup 312