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Dear SaaStr: How Much Should a SaaS Company Invest in Professional Services? Now how much to invest is a different question. Don’t Forget the Services Revenue (image from here ) The post Dear SaaStr: How Much Should a SaaS Company Invest in Professional Services? Oftentimes, changing more than Salesforce does itself.
Dear SaaStr: How Do You Evaluate Startups for Seed Investments? Its a high bar, but if the founders dont meet it, Ive found there is a 0% chance of making enough money for a venture investment to work out. The post Dear SaaStr: How Do You Evaluate Startups for Seed Investments? Better than I was as a founder? It’s hard.
Dear SaaStr: Why Do Angels Invest Even if Most Of Them Fail? True angels invest so early, maybe only 2 out of 50 make any real money. If it’s just 1 Big Winner out of 50 angel investments, to even just double your money, that winner has to do 100x. And is a 10x Return Even Enough? You’re right, 10x isn’t enough.
Billion To Invest in More B2B Companies appeared first on SaaStr. But there have only been 4 B2B / SaaS IPOs since 2021, and M&A is way down. That leads to stress. The post SaaS Is Back, But Different: Insight Partners Raises $12.5
Speaker: Peter Cowen, Managing Director, Sutton Capital Partners & Tim Draper, Founder, Draper Associates
Join Peter Cowen, Managing Director at Sutton Capital Partners, with top VCs looking at the trends and perspectives on investing in today’s climate. Come join us for any of these sessions to hear from these top seasoned investors and get answers to these questions: How are VCs now looking at investing in the short term?
I’ve invested almost $200m as part of SaaStr Fund / 2024. Make the cold email so great, you’d want to invest based on just it alone. Make the cold email so great, you’d want to invest based on just it alone. Is this the type of investments they do? VCs don’t expect investments to be perfect. They right stage?
The worst investments for me have one common theme: The founder was a bit of a B.S. I still invested. The post The One Thing My Worst Investments Had in Common appeared first on SaaStr. It’s a fine line between being a salesperson, and being the #1 evangelist and advocate … and being a B.S. It’s so hard.
Since then, I’ve made some pretty good other investments as well. The top reasons an investment has turned out to be a Zero: #1. The post The Investments Where I’m Going to Lose All My Money appeared first on SaaStr. cash Second was Algolia leading U.S. But also, I made some that … weren’t.
GTMfund’s 3 Areas of Focus for Investing Thanksgiving weekend is always a period of reflection and gratitude. Reflection across go-to-market trends, but also on the investment front (not to mention community !). A common misconception is that the name is representative of the type of software we invest in.
Join Peter Cowen, Managing Director at Sutton Capital Partners with top VCs looking at the trends and perspectives on investing in today’s climate. Come join us for any of these sessions to hear from these top seasoned investors and get answers to these questions: How are VCs now looking at investing in the short term?
Dear SaaStr: Should You Always Ask a Co-founder to Invest Their Own Money? And many times even a small investment will be very stressful for some co-founders. However, whoever contributes cash should usually either be repaid, at least partially, or get extra equity for that investment. I made 12x on that investment.
Dear SaaStr: Do angel investors or seed venture capitalists normally ask for detailed budgets including cash flow analysis before investing, even though most of the numbers will be pure speculation? The post Do Angel Investors and Seed VCs Ask for Detailed Budgets Before Investing? When it is, you can learn a lot.
We’re obviously written up a lot about Fundraising and Investing here on SaaStr.com, but time and time again, SaaStr CEO and Founder Jason Lemkin has seen so many Founders sign a bad term sheet based on gut instinct, VC celebrity or vibes, and while that may be fine, it’s not enough.
Most Smaller VC Funds ($100m or smaller fund) would like to own 10% or more after a Seed or Pre-Seed Investment , but typically model around 7% average ownership. If it’s not a core investment, VC funds may be more flexible. But these exceptions to ownership targets make these investments non-core.
Speaker: Peter Cowen, Managing Director, Sutton Capital Partners & Ben Narasin, Venture Partner, NEA
Join Peter Cowen, Managing Director at Sutton Capital Partners with top VCs looking at the trends and perspectives on investing in today’s climate. Come join us for any of these sessions to hear from these top seasoned investors and get answers to these questions: How are VCs now looking at investing in the short term?
Dear SaaStr: Have You Ever Made a Very Risky Investment That Paid Off Big Time? More of the story here: The post Dear SaaStr: Have You Ever Made a Very Risky Investment That Paid Off Big Time? In my first start-up, the VCs pulled our term sheet between signing and closing. But sometimes … you just do it. appeared first on SaaStr.
Those rare investments that return enough money to the VC fund to pay off at least 1x the total fund size. And you can see VCs are often pretty careful to make sure structurally, any given investment can do it. Investing in the #3 or #4 in a space? It’s not what anyone hoped when they invested. A 1% stake?
More operators behind fast-growing SaaS companies are turning to angel investing - not just as a way to diversify but to actively support the companies they believe in.This is core to GTMfunds thesis: providing investment access and opportunity to operators.
Share everything anyone would want to know to invest in you. But unless you are raising from folks that truly invest pre-revenue, investors are going to want to see 3 strong months of growth in a row. If nothing else, point out an existing investment or two theyve made that is somewhat similar to yours. # Share it all.
Join Peter Cowen, Managing Director at Sutton Capital Partners with top VCs looking at the trends and perspectives on investing in today’s climate. Come join us for any of these sessions to hear from these top seasoned investors and get answers to these questions: How are VCs now looking at investing in the short term?
Having led sales teams of 500+ at BILL and 800+ at HubSpot, Michelle has unique insights into what makes great frontline managers and why investing in them is crucial for sustainable growth. “At HubSpot, I had over 100 frontline sales managers reporting to me. ” The bottom line?
In a recent Office Hours, Baris Gultekin, Head of AI at Snowflake & a friend from Google, shared his insights into Snowflake’s approach to AI. It was a great conversation to understand how one of the leading data companies is pushing AI forward. The video for the session is here & the audio is here.
3 Came from the Investment Bank They Hired. In my experience, hiring an investment bank to help you in any acquisition > $100m or so is critical. Hit $20m ARR, growing 30%-40%, with little to no burn, and PE firms will begin to find you. #2. They Ran a Crisp, Tight Process And Got 4 Offers to Buy Them.
Having been through 4 acquisitions in different forms (founder, exec, etc), it’s a lot like a venture capital investment. A ton of time is invested negotiating price, and then way, way too much time on inconsequential legal terms, and then … it closes. Usually, there isn’t actually a ton of time to really get to know each other first.
It's a must-read for SaaS companies looking to attract investment and achieve sustainable growth. The article guides SaaS executives in developing strong payment strategies, focusing on the right platform selection, user experience, and ensuring security and compliance.
But it’s clear that it’s still in the investing phase, and increasing spend in sales & marketing. Outside of a pre-IPO phase, Klaviyo has been cash-flow positive or close for most of its history. Today, it’s steadily driving its margins up, now up to 14% non-GAAP operating margins.
Follow the Pilot-Repeat-Enlarge Methodology Pilot : Start small with minimal investment. Use a Hypothesis-Driven Approach For each campaign, establish: A clear hypothesis Time limits Budget constraints Minimum success criteria Most importantly, define what “success” looks like before you start.
The winner(s) will receive funding from the Mayfield AI Garage, who are at the forefront of investing in cutting-edge tools at the intersection of SaaS and AI. You could win $500K – $5M in funding from Mayfield AI Garage!! That’s right. This is epic opportunity to showcase your AI Startup. Win $500k – up to $5M in funding.
It’s now falling to 150 because 81% percent of the dollars invested in venture capital at the height of the boom came from non-traditional venture capital firms which are all very likely to leave investing. US venture funding went from 8 to 300 over 15 years.
Forward-thinking marketing organizations have continuously invested in a database strategy for enabling marketing processes. It involves finding a data management provider that can append contacts with correct information — in real-time.
In my ecosystem, most do another start-up, invest, or do something related: For some, it’s ego. Dear SaaStr: Why Do CEOs Keep Working After Making a Lot of Money? It’s a great question. Some don’t keep working. Some are happily retired. But not most in my ecosystem. For some, they get bored. For some, it’s to go even bigger.
I havent done that, but Ive done handshake deals in one day in maybe 50% of my investments (i.e, Not literally months to do the homework that doesnt take long but sometimes months to see enough progress for the investment to make sense to me, to connect enough dots. Yes, term sheets get done in one day.
There are really three modes from a VC perspective during a fundraising pitch: You Almost immediately want to do the investment. This is 80%+ of the investments Ive done. Almost all my investments at SaaStr Fund , Ive told the founders before the meetings end that Im in if everything theyve said checks out. The Likely Nos.
Basically I only invest in first-timers. First-timers do just as well, if not better, than second-timers. And they are much more capital-efficient. Not always, but often. And they lack the biases of second-timers. The post 6 Of The Most Common Mistakes I See First Time SaaS Founders Make appeared first on SaaStr.
If you’re investing in a B2B sales training initiative, give your program the best chance of success by implementing a reinforcement program designed to improve retention and keep the momentum of your training message going until your reps have the opportunity to really apply it. Or will it all be forgotten within days?
Don’t underestimate the investments you need to make here to be compelling to your customers. Another big investment during rapid growth is digital moments. You want to invest time and energy here so that partners are ready to talk to customers. Then, package that up into a narrative that makes sense.
But I’d say 90% of SaaS companies I work with and have invested in don’t get these basics right for a long, long time. Even if churn isn’t that high today — it likely will be later. I see many SaaS start-ups with mediocre retention with … mediocre NPS (20-30). Yes, a lot of this sounds basic. Not for real. NPS is A Great Core Metric.
Their “sense” of what things cost is often just way too low once they start to invest the first round of VC capital they raise. And how much that dramatically drives up the burn rate and cost of doing business. Dramatically. This especially bites founders that get pretty far bootstrapping.
Massive investments, at massive valuations, into the biggest leaders of AI. Now there’s a lot going on here and part of the rush in 2024 and 2025 is that more capital is coming into VC again. But it still shows where the energy and momentum are. At a scale we haven’t seen before.
It's important to also invest in building a passive candidate pipeline. At some point in your role as a recruiter - perhaps more frequently than not - you'll need to fill a position quickly and you'll look for active recruitment strategies to do it.
The purpose of the detailed information is to help investors (both institutional and retail) make informed investment decisions. The document contains a plethora of information on the company including a general overview, up to date financials, risk factors to the business, cap table highlights and much more.
But that’s probably not what the VC that just invested in you makes. “Carry” in the column on the left is how much of the gains on the investments per fund they keep. So that “Partner” that invested in you might have 4%-7% carry or less if they don’t run the place. Now that’s cash comp.
The losses arent equal, and you can mitigate them by not making further investments. Why $300 Billion? Roughly, VCs model losing money on about 40% of their deals, but only 20% overall. So if roughly weve raised $300B a year over the past 5 years, more or less then 20% of that total would be $300 Billion.
Organizations that invest heavily in customer success earlier see much higher customer retention and loyalty than the competition. But you have to be intentional and clear on what and where you want to invest to drive that high-value impact. You’ll likely retain these long-term, dedicated customers and brand ambassadors.
Without these insights, marketing campaigns can feel more like guesswork, with high investment and little return. One of the biggest challenges for any B2B marketer is understanding your prospects’ next move — who is most likely to buy and when. We’re here to tell you there’s a better way.
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