Intercom, Inc.

OCTOBER 16, 2019

The SaaS industry is constantly evolving, and for many companies in the space, that means having to evolve their business model. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean a “pivot”, but more often the evolution is a shifting business model as the company scales and the user base grows and changes. The classic example sees a company move from niche startup to mainstream scale-up, but it can also see companies hone their product-market fit by focusing on a more specialized, and yet more lucrative, us

Business Model 195

Business Model Scale Pricing Payment Methods 195

Tom Tunguz

OCTOBER 14, 2019

We are very excited about open source software. Open source is a powerful distribution mechanism to get software and people’s hands early and easily. In an era where SaaS customer acquisition cost increases monotonically , open source can be a powerful antidote. The other area that we are spending time in is open source at the application tier.

Engineering 181

Engineering Innovation User Experience Acquisition 181

ProfitWell

OCTOBER 16, 2019

It’s the question on every SaaS founder’s lips: Is my churn rate too high? While it might sound like a simple question on the surface, the answer is anything but. A “good” churn rate for one company might be terrible for another. Worse, comparing average churn rates across different markets and industries will leave you mired in confusing statistics and contradicting studies.

Churn 55

Churn SaaS Payments Payments Payment Methods 55

SaaStr

OCTOBER 12, 2019

Just a few years ago, as the next generation of SaaS companies were beginning to scale, the idea of building a Big or Biggish SaaS Company using Silos-in-the-Enterprise was all the rage. For many it still is. But there are a lot of flaws to this thinking it’s worth taking a look at. First, just to get on the same page … a Silo-in-the-Enterprise is a small or smallish group in a BigCo that adopts your product.

Enterprise 160

Enterprise Scale Finance Scaling 160

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Payment Solutions

Groove HQ

OCTOBER 15, 2019

Josh Kohlbach developed a unique customer experience strategy during his time working as a marketing consultant for small businesses. Business was good, and demand was strong. So strong, he soon hired two developers to help him keep up with the work. The problem was: the business was taking over his life. “I think we ran […]. The post Customer Experience Strategy: How This Startup Used Customer Reviews to Gain Traction appeared first on Groove Blog.

Startup 97

Startup Strategy Consulting Development 97

ChurnZero

OCTOBER 18, 2019

Churn Monster #14: Know-It-All Customer. . Hi churn fighters! We have a new churn monster to introduce to you today – a Know-It-All customer. A Know-It-All customer is someone who behaves as if they know everything, and constantly presents their input as though they were professionally trained or have firsthand insight into subjects when it is evident that is not the case.

Churn 40

Churn Underperforming Technical Team Scale Customer Success 40

Chargify

OCTOBER 14, 2019

Customer support has always been important in the SaaS industry, but its importance is only growing. . Customers expect more authenticity in their relationships with the companies they do business with — and excellent customer support is perhaps the most critical component of customer relationships. If you’re not providing award-winning customer support, you might find yourself quickly losing your competitive edge.

Customer Support 68

Customer Support Merchant Services SaaS Scale 68

Sales Hacker

OCTOBER 18, 2019

Many sales leaders think their onboarding process stinks… . And it’s true. . According to Bridge Group, 26% of sales leaders list ramping new reps as their top concern. Yet 3 out of 5 reps will not fully ramp for seven months. One in five will take nearly a year to develop all of the skills and behaviors they need to be successful. . That’s troublesome when efficient onboarding programs can improve employee performance by 11.5% and drive a massive impact on revenue. .

Sales Hiring 42

Sales Hiring Onboarding Sales Technical Review 42

The Daily Egg

OCTOBER 16, 2019

You’ve reached article 4 in our A/B testing series. In case you missed the first three, here’s a recap: A Beginner’s Guide to A/B Testing with Crazy Egg A/B Testing: How and Where to Start Best Practices and Pro Tips for Using an A/B Testing Tool Now it’s time to move onto the final chapter: […]. The post How to Understand and Act On Your A/B Test Results appeared first on The Daily Egg.

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Payment Solutions

For Entrepreneurs with David Skok

OCTOBER 15, 2019

For the seventh year in a row, we’re proud to work with KBCM Technology Group (formerly Pacific Crest Securities) to share results from a survey of ~424 private SaaS companies. Thank you to the readers of forEntrepreneurs who participated in taking the survey! Thank you also to David Spitz (@dspitz) and the team at KBCM Technology.

SaaS 225

SaaS Technology Revenue Startup 225

SaaStr

OCTOBER 18, 2019

A few seasons back, we wrote a post on hitting how in SaaS, you have to be putting the resources in place by Q3 to hit the plan for the next year. We update this post a bit annually as we head into next year’s planning procress. I still see most startups way behind on their 2020 planning, and most importantly, hiring, at this point in the year.

Sales Hiring 216

Sales Hiring Scale Headcount Revenue 216

Intercom, Inc.

OCTOBER 14, 2019

I’m a crappy poker player and always have been. Part of the reason for this is I’m easy to read. For a long time, I thought my inability to bluff would hamstring me in sales, but now I see it differently. I’ve come to view authenticity as a kind of sales superpower. Being transparent has helped me connect with customers on a deeper level than would have been possible otherwise.

Software Review 162

Software Review AWS Social Media Artificial Intelligence 162

Predictable Revenue

OCTOBER 17, 2019

Enterprise deals are tough, long, and require a robust product to compete. Find out how Proposify went from selling self serve deals to working with enterprise clients. The post Swimming upstream: how Proposify went from selling self serve deals to working with enterprise clients with CEO Kyle Racki appeared first on Predictable Revenue.

Enterprise 145

Enterprise Revenue 145

Speaker: David Warren and Kevin O'Neill Stoll

Transitioning to a usage-based business model offers powerful growth opportunities but comes with unique challenges. How do you validate strategies, reduce risks, and ensure alignment with customer value? Join us for a deep dive into designing effective pilots that test the waters and drive success in usage-based revenue. Discover how to develop a pilot that captures real customer feedback, aligns internal teams with usage metrics, and rethinks sales incentives to prioritize lasting customer eng

Revenue

Tom Tunguz

OCTOBER 17, 2019

Dr. Daniel Kahneman features on the latest Farnam Street podcast and it’s a surprising episode. Kahneman wrote Thinking Fast and Slow. I admire Kahneman a great deal. Not for his Nobel or for his work, which are both impressive, but for his humility. Some of the key tenets of Kahneman’s work in his famous book were disproved. And he owned up to it , both in print and on the podcast.

Interviewing 144

Interviewing Forecasting Management 144

SaaStr

OCTOBER 15, 2019

Lots of us fantasize about moving upmarket, but are unsure of how to get started, is it just a matter of hiring a team of SDRs and getting them to hit the phones? At Mapistry, moving upmarket is exactly what CEO, Allie Janoch, set out to do two years ago and in this talk, she and Lauren Alexander, Mapistry’s VP of Marketing and Demand Generation, will share the playbook they have developed for generating warm leads in a market of buyers unused to purchasing software.

Underperforming Technical Team 198

Underperforming Technical Team Sales Hiring SMB compliance 198

For Entrepreneurs with David Skok

OCTOBER 15, 2019

For the seventh year in a row, we’re proud to work with KBCM Technology Group (formerly Pacific Crest Securities) to share results from a survey of ~424 private SaaS companies. Thank you to the readers of forEntrepreneurs who participated in … The post 2019 SAAS Private Survey Results- Part 1 appeared first on For Entrepreneurs.

SaaS 130

SaaS Technology Revenue Startup 130

Intercom, Inc.

OCTOBER 17, 2019

For once, the big debate isn’t about the brand of Post-Its or Sharpies. It’s not personas versus Jobs-to-be-Done. It’s not even about what should be a roadmap and what shouldn’t be. It’s about this idea that there’s a core difference between the output of a product team and the business outcome generated. I’m joined in episode six of Intercom on Product, as always, by SVP of Product Paul Adams, who spoke about this topic at a recent conference.

Scale 119

Scale Sales Hiring Engineering Sales 119

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Enterprise

Andreessen Horowitz

OCTOBER 17, 2019

The plan was to drink until the pain over. But what’s worse, the pain or the hangover? —Kanye West, “Dark Fantasy”. When you found a company, it tends to get wired into your nervous system. I used to become physically … The post Which Way Do You Run? appeared first on Andreessen Horowitz.

Leadership 111

Leadership 111

SaaStr

OCTOBER 16, 2019

Why is it dangerous to accept too high of a valuation from an investor for a startup company? A lot of VC advice is a bit self-serving. There are risks with a too-high valuation — but also benefits: A high valuation has two core advantages for founders: Less dilution. Not only does this mean you own more, but it also means you can sell more later for the same amount of dilution.

Startup 197

Startup Venture Capital Acquisition Investment 197

Neil Patel

OCTOBER 15, 2019

The other day I was recording a podcast episode with my co-host Eric Siu and he wanted to discuss something in particular. He wanted to talk about how I got to 62,000 Instagram followers in a very short period of time and without spending any money on ads or marketing. Eric is a great marketer as well, and when it comes to social media, he spends much more time than me on it and he even has people at his ad agency dedicated to helping him grow his personal brand online.

Social Media 111

Social Media Technical Review Branding Venture Capital 111

Nimble - Sales

OCTOBER 15, 2019

Choosing your next hosting provider is a big deal because digital marketing is critical to your success. If your business crashes and burns online, you’re in big trouble. Recently, our business got itself into a situation where we had to switch hosting providers, which was actually the inspiration for this article. We quickly realized that […].

Data 88

Data Marketing Business Technology 88

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ClinicSense is a SaaS platform that supports over 7,000 massage therapists who use it for appointment management, payments, scheduling, marketing activities and more. Despite having a relatively low payment failure rate, the company discovered that the failures disrupted the customer experience. This often led to churn as customers decided to cancel or abandon their account, preventing ClinicSense from realizing the full lifetime value (LTV) of its users.

Payments

Andreessen Horowitz

OCTOBER 16, 2019

Games have come a long way since Pong. Consisting of a single white pixel bouncing across the screen—a crude simulation of table tennis—the 1972 arcade classic was the nascent gaming industry’s first hit. Since then, games have grown from … The post State of Play: Six Trends Revolutionizing Games appeared first on Andreessen Horowitz.

Trends 112

Trends Mobile 112

SaaStr

OCTOBER 16, 2019

Salesforce Essentials and Mission.org came by SaaStr HQ and did a pretty unique podcast interview with me. We talked a lot about exits. About selling your company, lessons learned, and what the journey of selling a company really all means. There’s a lot in here we have never talked about it, and I think they did an amazing job producing it (i.e., high quality). “Even if there is a payout — which is rare — there are parts of an acquisition no one really talks about.

Interviewing 153

Interviewing Acquisition Strategy 153

Groove HQ

OCTOBER 17, 2019

I shared a story recently about one of the darkest moments of my career. We’re through it now and better because of it. But, woah… rough times. Two years ago, we were still in its grip. Our team retreat was just a few weeks away, and I was a wreck. Sitting at my kitchen table […]. The post Founder’s Depression Is B t appeared first on Groove Blog.

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Nimble - Sales

OCTOBER 17, 2019

Even if your business is profitable, sooner or later you will face the question of how to boost your sales. To achieve this goal, you need to analyze your company’s sales processes and determine exactly what you can do to boost returns. One of the main things you need to do is identifying sales opportunities. […]. The post Everything You Need to Know About Sales Opportunity Management appeared first on Nimble Blog.

Management 86

Management Sales Business 86

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Payments

Andreessen Horowitz

OCTOBER 16, 2019

It could all be so simple, but you had to make it hard. —Lauryn Hill, “X-Factor”. Almost every company has more data about their business than ever before, but very few are smarter for it. It turns out that radically … The post Sisu appeared first on Andreessen Horowitz.

Data 76

Data Business 76

SaaStr

OCTOBER 14, 2019

Are you a company with $20 ARR or more? Perhaps this is the SaaStr event you haven’t (but should’ve heard of) This year, SaaStr is hosting it’s first-ever SaaStr CXO Summit. We’ll be bringing 150+ CIOs, CDOs, CMOs, and 200+ top SaaS and Cloud CEOs. The SaaStr CXO Summit will be an event-within-an-event. From VIP lunches to exclusive content to CXO attendees and matchmaking for one-on-one meetings, we’ll have a packed day of content for attendees.

Cloud 153

Cloud SaaS 153

Kellblog

OCTOBER 13, 2019

Over the years I’ve noticed how different CEOs take different degrees of ownership and accountability when it comes to the board of directors. For example, once, after a long debate where the board unanimously approved a budget contingent on reducing proposed R&D spending from $12M to $10M, I overhead the founder/CEO telling the head of R&D to “spend $12M anyway” literally as we walked out of the meeting [1].

Sales Hiring 75

Sales Hiring Venture Capital Sales Recruiting Startup 75