Incredo
JANUARY 21, 2020
Conversational marketing has conquered the SaaS industry long ago. Software companies engage, qualify, and recommend visitors with the help of chatbots who set new rules for improving user experience. After exploring this post, you will know 1) What is conversational marketing and how it works, 2) What is making CM a successful strategy, 3) How to increase conversions through CM, 4) How your SaaS peers leverage CM so far.
Intercom, Inc.
JANUARY 23, 2020
? ?. For new tech companies, the outside world is filled with deadly traps. The situations that portend failure are varied and unfortunately common – no product-market fit, no cash, bad product, burnout, to name just a few of the most obvious. In this world, growth trumps all other priorities. The faster you grow, the more likely you are to achieve long-term success (and actually survive long enough to scale).
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
SaaStr
JANUARY 21, 2020
By Avanish Sahai, Google Cloud VP of ISV & Application Partners. At SaaStr Annual, we’ll be sharing stories of how a few of our SaaS partners enable enterprises to change the way they do business. I am a former CXO and current investor and board member in the B2B software space. For several years, I was also the leader of the Salesforce AppExchange, the first “born in the cloud” ISV and technology partner ecosystem, and saw many companies in their journey from inception to exit.
Totango
JANUARY 23, 2020
You are not powerless in the face of churn. There are almost always indicators that a customer is going to churn, which means that if identified early, a good Customer Success team can mitigate the risk and execute a successful recovery plan. Some churn is inevitable no matter what business model you employ, but it does not just occur randomly. Think of churn like a risk that can be negotiated like any other. .
Advertiser: ZoomInfo
AI adoption is reshaping sales and marketing. But is it delivering real results? We surveyed 1,000+ GTM professionals to find out. The data is clear: AI users report 47% higher productivity and an average of 12 hours saved per week. But leaders say mainstream AI tools still fall short on accuracy and business impact. Download the full report today to see how AI is being used — and where go-to-market professionals think there are gaps and opportunities.
Kellblog
JANUARY 24, 2020
As loyal readers know, I’m a reductionist , always trying to find the shortest, simplest way of saying things even if some degree of precision gets lost in the process and even if things end up more subtle than they initially appear. For example, my marketing mission statement of “makes sales easier” is sometimes misinterpreted as relegating marketing to a purely tactical role, when it actually encompasses far more than that.
SaaS Brief brings together the best content for SaaS professionals from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
Baremetrics
JANUARY 22, 2020
In 2018 we launched a product called Baremetrics Intros, which essentially helped companies and investors find each other based on their actual data instead of just who they knew. Three months later… we shut it down. It was, commercially, a failure. We just couldn’t get any investors (our target) to fork over any cash. We opted to shut it down instead of going deeper down an already risky rabbit hole.
Intercom, Inc.
JANUARY 21, 2020
I studied the first screen of 25 popular iOS apps to determine how much text they use. The results shows us the value of taking a principled approach to writing text for mobile apps – because product design is still all about the words. Mobile apps dominate our digital experiences. People downloaded a record 204 billion of them from the Google and Apple app stores in 2019.
Outseta
JANUARY 20, 2020
By Geoff Roberts 20 min read. Last month I woke up to a Twitter update that Buildium , where I started my career, had been sold for $580M. Five hundred and eighty million dollars, I mouthed out loud. Holy f**k. I’m pretty jaded when it comes to the financial numbers that get thrown around in start-up land—I don’t care what TechCrunch says, I don’t care what your market cap is—I think it’s clear that the world of technology start-ups is pretty screwed up when it comes to financial valuations.
SaaStr
JANUARY 21, 2020
Justin Welsh, former SVP of Sales at PatientPop explains how he started in SaaS in 2009 as the second sales hire at Zocdoc. Justin used Sales Culture to grow a successful PatientPop team to 140 employees and 55 million in revenue. Want to see more content like this? Join us at SaaStr Annual 2020. Justin Welsh | SVP Sales @ PatientPop. FULL TRANSCRIPT BELOW.
Speaker: Pete Uselman, Director of Partner Experience at Wind River Payments
Most integrated payments providers share a percent of the payment revenue with their software partners. But, oftentimes, that revenue share is only a fraction of the true income potential software providers can realize. If you want to maximize income opportunities from your payments program, check out Wind River Payments’ webinar-on-demand.
Tom Tunguz
JANUARY 23, 2020
Today, the world's most valuable brand is Apple. Forbes estimates Apple's brand is worth $205B. Why is Apple's brand worth so much? It's the trust the brand inspires in consumers. Apple customers know Apple the company. They understand the product philososphy, the history, the quality of typical Apple products, and the reputation for quality. A strong brand is the lagging indicator of having built trust.
Predictable Revenue
JANUARY 20, 2020
Just because what you are selling is unique, it doesn’t mean that it must be hard to find people who would buy it and convince them to do so. Indeed, the biggest drawback of being in a unique niche is figuring out where you stand in the product landscape and how competitive the market is. The post How to sell if you work in a unique niche appeared first on Predictable Revenue.
Andreessen Horowitz
JANUARY 21, 2020
This is an abbreviated version of a presentation I gave live at the a16z Summit in November 2019. You can watch a video version on YouTube. In the not-too-distant future, I believe nearly every company will derive a significant … The post Every Company Will Be a Fintech Company appeared first on Andreessen Horowitz.
SaaStr
JANUARY 20, 2020
Q: What will SaaS companies look like in the future? I’m no brilliant futurist, but here’s what I see in the best SaaS companies today, so I assume will be table-stakes going forward: The Bay Area will remain a draw, but mainly as a small-ish HQ. Everyone will become distributed by employee #10. Yes, this has started, but in a few years, it will be the default.
Speaker: Ben Epstein, Stealth Founder & CTO | Tony Karrer, Founder & CTO, Aggregage
When tasked with building a fundamentally new product line with deeper insights than previously achievable for a high-value client, Ben Epstein and his team faced a significant challenge: how to harness LLMs to produce consistent, high-accuracy outputs at scale. In this new session, Ben will share how he and his team engineered a system (based on proven software engineering approaches) that employs reproducible test variations (via temperature 0 and fixed seeds), and enables non-LLM evaluation m
Sales Hacker
JANUARY 20, 2020
We all get a lot of emails. But if you ask anyone who has had a “C” or a “VP” at the front of their title, you’ll quickly learn that most modern executives face a firehose of sales reps, recruiters, marketers, and pick-your-brain-over-coffee-ers making direct requests for their time every day. Executives read so many cold emails, they get a front-row seat to the most overused email templates and the worst email writing habits.
FastSpring
JANUARY 23, 2020
Welcome to the fourth edition in the Affiliate Series. The purpose of these articles is to share best practices to help you get the most out of your affiliate program. Catch up on the previous three articles, here: So You Created an Affiliate Program—Now What? 3 Simple Tips for Recruiting Successful Affiliate Partners. How to Effectively Communicate with Your Affiliate Partners.
Andreessen Horowitz
JANUARY 23, 2020
This is a written version of a presentation I gave live at the a16z Summit in November 2019. You can watch a video version on YouTube. With so much technology in our everyday lives, it’s easy to wonder: Are … The post Four Trends in Consumer Tech appeared first on Andreessen Horowitz.
SaaStr
JANUARY 24, 2020
Q: What should a startup know before rejecting an outside investor? Know they may not be there later. Investing in start-ups is very risky. Not only do most start-ups fail, but it is more than that. It’s really hard to do enough diligence in enough time: It’s hard to really get to know the team that well. You might have literally just met them. And often, they will have zero real track record, or close to zero.
Advertisement
For SaaS businesses, improving retention is one of the easiest and most effective ways to drive revenue and profits. With a clear link between failed payments and customer churn, having a robust failed payment recovery solution isn’t optional—it’s essential. Achieving your retention goals starts with the right solution.
Sales Hacker
JANUARY 22, 2020
If you think sales is a simple job, I have a few hundred professional connections who would like a word with you. There’s a common idea that salespeople are only judged on their quota. But as straightforward as their metrics may be, their jobs are anything but simple. There’s a range of key skills that separate the best from the rest, and success belongs to companies who can identify and hire reps who have those precious skills.
Teamgate
JANUARY 23, 2020
Other than ensuring that your SaaS product is running like a well-oiled machine, do you know the other thing that keeps developers up at night? They would ask themselves how to increase their sales. Mind you, acquiring new customers is one of the most challenging things that you should do when you are in SaaS. No wonder some companies would tap the help of a SaaS marketing agency to take the load off of their shoulders.
Andreessen Horowitz
JANUARY 24, 2020
Clayton Christensen (1952-2020) pioneered disruption theory, one of the most influential — and misunderstood ! — theories that has influenced thinkers and makers in Silicon Valley and beyond. Whether it was the insight that the next big thing always starts … The post Clay Christensen on Business and Life appeared first on Andreessen Horowitz.
SaaStr
JANUARY 20, 2020
Q: As a salesperson, should I also learn marketing? In the start-up world, the earlier stage the startup, the more most roles overlap with other roles. In sales, at 100 sales reps, there is no overlap between sales and marketing. You do your scheduled meetings, you hit your number, you answer the standard 10 objections and talking points, you ship the collateral you are given.
Advertiser: ZoomInfo
ZoomInfo customers aren’t just selling — they’re winning. Revenue teams using our Go-To-Market Intelligence platform grew pipeline by 32%, increased deal sizes by 40%, and booked 55% more meetings. Download this report to see what 11,000+ customers say about our Go-To-Market Intelligence platform and how it impacts their bottom line. The data speaks for itself!
Sales Hacker
JANUARY 23, 2020
Can you describe your brand of selling in three words or less? The topic of self-branding gets thrown around a lot. However, rarely is it given the same attention as product branding. The good news is that the same strategies that turn products into household names can also turn people into respected thought leaders known around the world. Learn to brand your (SELF) and you can improve your sales game and career trajectory.
Teamgate
JANUARY 23, 2020
Email is an essential communication tool that every business and professional needs. Compared to other means of communication, sending an email is fast, convenient, and less intrusive. That way, it enables you to communicate with customers and clients and even set up meetings without having to spend much time making phone calls. . As much as a work email can be excellent in helping you get things done, it can also hinder productivity if it’s mismanaged.
FastSpring
JANUARY 21, 2020
Subscriptions are the lifeblood of any SaaS business model. On the surface, it’s a perfect model. A customer subscribes to your product, and every month, they pay to keep their access to it. Simple, right? However, SaaS subscriptions can also cost businesses money if they’re not set up with the customer’s experience in mind. There will come a situation where a customer may put the wrong card information on file, or their card may expire without them realizing, and leave you una
SaaStr
JANUARY 20, 2020
Q: Is Silicon Valley a giant Ponzi scheme, given that so many of the hottest startups are not able to generate a profit? Look, I mean, there may be an element of that here. But it’s a very existential one. Why is a share of a public company worth anything at all ? No one is quite sure. Literally, no economist or banker can say for sure. But the theory is that it represents a share of present and future profits, discounted to a current value.
Advertisement
Simplify omnichannel payments with a solution that unifies every channel through your platform. By integrating front-end systems like online, mobile, and in-store payments with robust back-end infrastructure, you can deliver a seamless payments experience without the need for heavy engineering. Omnitoken technology enhances security by tokenizing card transactions for reuse, enabling merchants to drive cross-selling opportunities.
Cobloom
JANUARY 20, 2020
A product demo should be a valuable tool for getting new customers signed-up to your SaaS product. Should be. In a huge number of cases, potentially lucrative demos are quickly turning into a sinkhole of wasted resources. Companies are investing valuable time and energy into running product demos, and instead of growing their business, they're throwing away potential sales.
Andreessen Horowitz
JANUARY 24, 2020
Chinese New Year, the biggest holiday in Chinese culture, is traditionally celebrated with family gatherings, fireworks, a national TV show with over a billion viewers, and gifted red envelopes (stuffed with money). For large tech platforms, the tradition of gifting … The post Games, Memes, and Giveaways: How Tech Celebrates Chinese New Year appeared first on Andreessen Horowitz.
Expert insights. Personalized for you.
313 
Let's personalize your content