SaaStr

MAY 27, 2023

Dear SaaStr: When is a Startup Ready to Raise Venture Capital These Days? First, bear in mind, start-up fundraising has gotten a lot harder than it’s been the past few years. A lot harder. The latest Carta data summarizes it well: But while raise VC capital has gotten harder, the rough rules in B2B / SaaS haven’t really changed: Seed Round: $10k-$100k a month in revenue Growing 150% annually or more Strong founders, including strong technical co-founder Series A: $2m ARR or more ($

Venture Capital 234

Venture Capital Startup CTO Churn 234

Tom Tunguz

JUNE 1, 2023

If we assume some basic productivity gains in a typical SaaS company from AI in the next 12-24 months, how much more profitable will the business be? Sales development, content marketing, & software engineering strike me as the workstreams that will benefit immediately. Team Team Productivity Gain % of Company Overall Gain SDR/BDR 15% 10% 1.5% Content marketing 30% 5% 1.5% Engineering 25% 40% 10% Overall - - 13% See assumptions here 1 This thought experiment highlights a few ideas to validat

AI 309

AI Startup Scale Headcount 309

User Pilot

MAY 31, 2023

Wondering how to unlock the full potential of your survey data and if survey data analysis will be of any help? The sheer volume of data generated can quickly become overwhelming, and this is where survey data analysis can help you. Survey data analysis is a powerful tool that allows you to delve deep into your user base's thoughts, opinions, and sentiments.

Data Analysis 79

Data Analysis Scaling Artificial Intelligence Data 79

IT World

MAY 30, 2023

Edge, sit down. We need to talk. (You too, Bing.) Lately you’ve gone from a browser that was ignored by many but had the potential to be a very well-behaved and secure browser to one that is being, well, a bit pushy. And Bing has been taking a page from your playbook and gotten a little pushy as well. Let’s take a recent change with Edge that is now exposed with controls.

Engineering 97

Engineering 97

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Payment Solutions

Kellblog

MAY 30, 2023

This is a quick post to remind everyone who’s attending SaaStock USA in Austin later this week to come to my session at 2:30 pm on Thursday, June 1 on the Scale Stage, entitled How to Connect Your C-Suite to the Ground Truth. I’ve always believed that the hardest part of strategy is not figuring out what to do given what’s going on, but instead, more fundamentally, figuring out what’s going on — and getting consensus about that with your C-suite team.

Scaling 92

Scaling Strategy 92

Sales Hacker

MAY 30, 2023

What exactly do you “challenge” during a discovery? And how do you “challenge” your prospects without turning them off? Join this session with Becc Holland of Flip the Script to find out how to “challenge” prospects in a way that truly helps them & encourages them to buy. You’ll learn: How to uncover the prospect’s self-diagnosis & your expert-diagnosis How to “challenge” the difference The difference between a “misdiagnosis” & a “missed diagnosis” A complete list of the types of: Pr

Sales 68

Sales 68

Buffer Resources

MAY 31, 2023

In Antler’s 2023 Creator Economy report , 24 percent of creators surveyed highlighted longevity as a major concern — and for good reason. Even though it’s common to come across creators who are making enough income to go full-time, it’s just as common for creators to fade into oblivion. YouTuber Matt Koval puts the average creator career span at five to seven years (and that’s for the really persistent ones).

Technical Review 103

Technical Review Social Media Software Review Startup 103

yoursales

JUNE 1, 2023

Capturing Client & Prospect Communication: Unveiling the Powerful Key to Sales Success In today’s hyper-competitive business landscape, where customer-centricity reigns supreme, the ability of capturing client & prospect communication has become a critical component for sales success. Consequently, sales leaders are concerned with how to harness the power of understanding what’s going on in client & prospect communication.

Communication 80

Communication Underperforming Technical Team Sales compliance 80

Zuora

MAY 31, 2023

In 2023, there are still on-prem billing solutions — crazy right? Well, as Beyonce says “let me upgrade you” with […] The post Billing System –> Monetization System = Modern Business appeared first on Zuora.

Payment Solutions 52

Payment Solutions Payments Business Finance 52

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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

SaaStr

JUNE 1, 2023

So in one of the latest SaaStr surveys , we saw what a lot of us are feeling … it’s just hard to hit quota out there. Only 18% of you were hitting the 70%+ quota attainment that high-performing sales teams generally try to hit. And only 43% of you had sales teams that were hitting even 43% of quota attainment. That left 58% of you with sales teams seeing 20%-40% quota attainment … or less.

Scale 257

Scale Sales Scaling 257

The Daily Egg

JUNE 2, 2023

As a freelancer, keeping your work organized and on track is crucial to sustainable success. Despite that, most project management tools aren’t. The post Best Project Management Tools for Freelancers appeared first on The Daily Egg.

Management 190

Management 190

Tom Tunguz

MAY 29, 2023

I’ve been using large-language models (LLMs) most days for the past few months for three major use cases : data analysis, writing code, & web search 1. Here’s what I’ve observed: First, coding incrementally works better than describing a full task all at once. Second, coding LLMs struggle to solve problems of their own creation, turning in circles, & debugging can require significant work.

ChatGPT 163

ChatGPT AI Search Artificial Intelligence Engineering 163

Clouded Judgement

JUNE 2, 2023

Every week I’ll provide updates on the latest trends in cloud software companies. Follow along to stay up to date! Dispersion! This week was quite interesting, with a number of big moves after quarterly reports. Let’s start with one obvious point - Q1s have been rough! Forget the outlook / guide for a minute. Just looking at Q1 in a vacuum we can say the quarters have objectively been quite bad.

Cloud 130

Cloud SMB Trends Subscription 130

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

SaaStr

JUNE 2, 2023

Dear SaaStr: Does Bootstrapping Through an Agency/Services Business Work? Running two businesses at once well is really, really hard. But I think if you are thoughtful about it, using an agency/services business can be a viable way to bootstrap your way into a SaaS business — as long as you transition over fairly early to doing your SaaS business 100%.

Business 221

Business Investment Software Scaling 221

IT World

JUNE 1, 2023

As generative AI tools such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Bard continue to evolve at a breakneck pace, raising questions around trustworthiness and even human rights, experts are weighing if or how the technology can be slowed and made more safe. In March, the nonprofit Future of Life Institute published an open letter calling for a six-month pause in the development of ChatGPT, the AI-based chatbot created by Microsoft-backed OpenAI.

AI 130

AI ChatGPT Generative AI Technology 130

Andreessen Horowitz

MAY 31, 2023

TABLE OF CONTENTS Generative AI is Coming for Insurance Because underwriting, selling, and servicing rely so heavily on humans processing large quantities of written or verbal communication, existing tools have struggled to properly automate these services and materially impact loss … The post Generative AI is Coming for Insurance (May 2023 Fintech Newsletter) appeared first on Andreessen Horowitz.

Generative AI 122

Generative AI AI Communication 122

Buffer Resources

MAY 29, 2023

Landing my very first client was surprisingly easy thanks to the power of referrals. The startup I had been working for had just folded, and I turned to the network of marketing leaders I had built from that job and let them know the types of client work I was looking for: digital brand management, content creation , and paid media strategy. In no time, someone recommended me to a woman who was just starting to build her digital brand—and she’s been a client ever since.

Sales Hiring 112

Sales Hiring Business Scale Social Media 112

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Large enterprises face unique challenges in optimizing their Business Intelligence (BI) output due to the sheer scale and complexity of their operations. Unlike smaller organizations, where basic BI features and simple dashboards might suffice, enterprises must manage vast amounts of data from diverse sources. What are the top modern BI use cases for enterprise businesses to help you get a leg up on the competition?

Enterprise

SaaStr

MAY 28, 2023

We’ve talked a lot on SaaStr about not screwing up that VP of Sales hire. Done right, it will accelerate your company to the next level. Done wrong — you can lose the better part of a year, and half of your last round of capital. And we’ve talked a lot about the trade-offs in the hire, including how to think about Stretch VPs … the ones that haven’t quite done it yet, but working for you is their shot.

Sales Hiring 222

Sales Hiring Scale Scaling Revenue 222

IT World

JUNE 1, 2023

Here comes an entirely new kind of computer. Events like this don’t happen often. So, we should all stop and marvel at the emergence of what I call the ARPC — the “augmented reality PC.” The “form factor” solves the decades-old desire to maximize screen size while minimizing hardware size. And it’s ideal for the age of remote work, digital nomad living, workcations, bleisure travel, staybaticals, hot-desking, hoteling, and every other future-of-work neologism that has emerged since the Covid pla

Travel 129

Travel 129

Sales Hacker

MAY 30, 2023

Get ready for Sales Hacker and Lavender ‘s new series: Pardon The Outbound, with Will Allred and Kristina Finseth. In this first episode, Will and Kristina check out a cold email that was sent to Will. Boy, oh boy, do they have some opinions in this one. And Will shares some cool data points, too! In the end, it’s all gravy, because Will and Kristina both re-wrote a new version of the email that they each think would do the job much better.

Sales 100

Sales Data Development 100

Buffer Resources

JUNE 1, 2023

Paul O’Malley’s YouTube channel , which features quick tips to improve efficiency, skyrocketed to over 30,000 subscribers in just under six months. Those are impressive numbers! So how did Paul do it? We sat down with him to discuss his journey and discover the strategies and techniques he used to rapidly grow his audience. Get ready to take notes and learn from a YouTube success story!

Technical Review 104

Technical Review ChatGPT Social Media Growth Hacking 104

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Payment Solutions

SaaStr

MAY 30, 2023

So one of the latest SaaStr surveys confirms what I’m seeing, and we’re seeing across many public SaaS companies. Hiring has way slowed down, but many folks are still hiring, albeit at a reduced rate. 56% of you aren’t hiring, or barely hiring. And very few of you are doubling headcount, vs everyone in 2021. But a good chunk of you are still hiring, albeit in moderation.

Sales Hiring 220

Sales Hiring Headcount Engineering Revenue 220

IT World

JUNE 2, 2023

Unlike the consumer metaverse, which was largely backed by Facebook and was effectively dead on arrival, the commercial metaverse is doing rather well. Nvidia is currently the darling of Wall Street and is the primary driver for the commercial metaverse. But creating this industrial-grade metaverse and the digital twins of real objects in it requires a lot of heavy lifting in terms of 3D scanning to duplicate real objects in this virtual environment.

106

106

ChurnZero

JUNE 2, 2023

A Customer Success Manager at a Series-B stage SaaS company had just learned a key contact—their customer champion—was moving on to a new role. The risk of churn was high since the new point of contact indicated they wanted to make some changes. “I just want you to know I’m probably going to replace you all with another tool,” the customer said.

Churn 98

Churn Scale Sales Hiring Customer Success 98

Buffer Resources

MAY 30, 2023

Question: Why have short-form videos become so popular in the past few years, and how can I use them for my social media? Move over software — there’s a new world eater in town. Short-form video snuck up on us, becoming the most consumed online content in a few years. It’s your best bet if the consensus is anything to go by — 85% of marketers say short-form video is the most effective format on social media.

Social Media 101

Social Media Entertainment Trends Branding 101

Speaker: Jay Allardyce, Deepak Vittal, and Terrence Sheflin

As we look ahead to 2025, business intelligence and data analytics are set to play pivotal roles in shaping success. Organizations are already starting to face a host of transformative trends as the year comes to a close, including the integration of AI in data analytics, an increased emphasis on real-time data insights, and the growing importance of user experience in BI solutions.

Trends

SaaStr

JUNE 2, 2023

In 2020-2021, many SaaS startups faced a unique challenge. With teams spread across the globe, they had to find new working patterns to scale their businesses in a distributed environment. Wiz, one of the fastest-growing SaaS companies focused on security solutions, was one of them. The company helps enterprises internationally with contextual and actionable insights to secure their cloud infrastructure.

Sales Recruiting 206

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Branding 206

IT World

MAY 30, 2023

Hundreds of tech industry leaders, academics, and others public figures signed an open letter warning that artificial intelligence (AI) evolution could lead to an extinction event and saying that controlling the tech should be a top global priority. “Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war,” read the statement published by San Francisco-based Center for AI Safety.

Artificial Intelligence 105

Artificial Intelligence ChatGPT Scale AI 105

Kellblog

JUNE 1, 2023

Earlier today I spoke at SaaStock USA in Austin and gave a presentation on connecting your c-suite to the ground truth. I think it’s important that startup founders and leaders understand how easy it is to get disconnected from the ground truth (i.e., the reality of the field, deals, and customer conversations) and how that problem only gets worse as you scale.

Scale 95

Scale Software Review Advertising Startup 95