SaaStr

NOVEMBER 2, 2023

So we’ve spent a ton of time over the years on SaaS talking about hiring a great VP of Sales. Not only because it really matters, but because hiring the wrong VP of Sales can set you back a year — or longer. They never invest the time after they start, either. 50% of what a VP of Sales really does is recruiting.

Sales Hiring 226

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Sales Interviewing 226

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 27, 2021

In the “old” days, there was a rough rule that as soon as you are bringing on more than 1–2 reps a quarter, you needed to hire a director of sales ops. That at that point, at a minimum, there would be too much administrative work for your VP of Sales to handle it herself. You want the sales ops help scaled up and helping before then.

Sales Hiring 217

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Sales 217

SaaStr

APRIL 18, 2021

Continuous Recruiting? Great cultures will create low-turn-over environments — and ones that will self-perpetuate and recruit others to join. Great cultures will create low-turn-over environments — and ones that will self-perpetuate and recruit others to join. Especially in your sales team. Continuous recruiting.

Sales Recruiting 286

Sales Recruiting Branding Investment Sales 286

SaaStr

AUGUST 8, 2023

So there’s a sort of org chart you’ll probably end up with at least twice as you start scaling in SaaS: The “Headless” Sales Org. It’s a bunch of sales reps without anyone to manage them other than … you. But if you end up not hiring a VP of Sales at that perfect moment in time (and most don’t), you’ll end up headless.

Sales Hiring 195

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Sales 195

SaaStr

MARCH 5, 2021

Flock Safety’s Founder and CEO, Garrett Langley, and its VP of Growth, Alex Latraverse, know a bit about sales. Enough to go from 0 to 100 sales reps in about 18 months — and they’re looking to be well beyond 100 by the end of this month. The three things that led to ramping up sales at Flock Safety were: Achieving product-market fit.

Sales Recruiting 175

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Sales 175

SaaStr

JULY 18, 2023

The most successful entrepreneurs I’ve invested in (6+ unicorns, 3 billion+ exits) are very different in many ways. Some engineers by training, others in sales or product originally. But a few uniting characteristics of the very best: Relentless Recruiters. You have to be constantly recruiting the best. No Excuses.

Sales Recruiting 202

Sales Recruiting Scale Scaling Engineering 202

SaaStr

AUGUST 30, 2022

On the investing side of life, the toughest meeting of all for me at least is probably the Right Co-Founder, Wrong CEO start-up. But after that, it starts to break down when you have to recruit a true management team, and in many cases, additional capital. They’ll know … Who can best recruit a management team?

Sales Recruiting 224

Sales Recruiting Technical Cofounder Scale Investment 224

SaaStr

JUNE 21, 2023

They hired their first VP of Sales with a wonderful pedigree and experience at some of the hottest startups. because they needed to rebuild the sales team. They rebuilt the sales team and closed some big deals. VCs can be fickle about what they fund, but if you have revenue, you have more leeway for when you take an investment.

Sales Recruiting 241

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Underperforming Technical Team Pricing 241

OpenView Labs

DECEMBER 16, 2019

So if scaling your sales organization is a priority in 2020, here are the things you need to be aware of to make sure you do so successfully. In my experience both as a salesperson and as a recruiter, it’s primarily been four things: They want the work they’re doing to matter to them. that you’re invested in their success).

Sales Recruiting 53

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Trends 53

SaaStr

JUNE 17, 2023

The toughest part in the end is always recruiting. Recruiting. Over time, that’s recruiting more and more senior folks, so the target changes. You’ll have to be recruiting new ones all the time. That means you are constantly recruiting. Dear SaaStr: How Should I Design My First Sales Rep Compensation Plan?

Sales Recruiting 166

Sales Recruiting Scale Compensation Business Model 166

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 27, 2023

From $1m in ARR, and Then Forever After: Recruiting Great VPs. You need to learn to become great at recruiting. Why is my sales team less efficient at $20m ARR than at $2m in ARR? Many functions simply need more bodies to keep up with larger bookings goals, and inefficiencies come from that, especially in sales-driven models.

Sales Recruiting 249

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Startup Scale 249

SaaStr

JULY 12, 2022

One of the first what How to Hire a Great VP of Sales at the New York Enterprise Tech Meet-Up (thank you to John Lehr and Work-Bench for setting this up). The Number One Thing You Can Do to Accelerate Your Business Post-Initial Traction is Hiring a Great VP of Sales. Now, I just invest in SasS companies. SaaStr is Turning 10!

Sales Hiring 254

Sales Hiring Part-Time VPE VP of Engineering Sales Recruiting 254

SaaStr

MAY 31, 2021

I’ve also invested in 24+ next-generation SaaS companies, mostly successes, and had a chance to watch and learn from them as well, with a new lens. And paying a little more for a lot more experience can be one of the top investments you’ll ever make. Sales — Not Easier. I’m not. Perhaps, I am worse.

Sales Recruiting 309

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Branding 309

SaaStr

OCTOBER 25, 2023

For part one of this Ask Me Anything session, Jason covers everything you need to know about hiring your first VP of Sales, what he really thinks about AI, what the future of lead generation in 2024 looks like, and much more. Lead generation tools do change, but the basic motions of sales and marketing haven’t changed much.

Scale 235

Scale Sales Hiring AI Sales Recruiting 235

SaaStr

MAY 21, 2023

My #1 Best Hack for VC Fundraising Only 7% of You Have Really Gotten Outsourced SDRs to Work 11 Signs To Predict If a Venture Investment Will or Won’t Work Out Top Podcasts This Week: 1. SaaStr 658: SaaStr CRO Confidential: Omni Founder Colin Zima on the Power of Leveraging Your Network for Sales and Recruiting  5.

Sales Recruiting 211

Sales Recruiting Startup Investment SaaS 211

SaaStr

JUNE 2, 2023

Recruit diverse leaders The goal of hiring a revenue leader is to put gasoline on finding product market fit success. So the playbook for Colin during that time was tuned to one goal: hire and scale a sales team that could listen to those customers and put together a value proposition with a complimentary tone that customers were reacting to.

Sales Recruiting 206

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Branding 206

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 2, 2024

The backup of 2020 was great, 2021 comes in and somehow we have 600 unicorns and everyone can burn 500 million a year or have huge sales teams. But the meta point is this, if you’re recruiting in 2024, beware of the “Lost Generation” candidate and persona you may come across. This starts to get tough.

Sales Recruiting 283

Sales Recruiting Trends Sales Hiring Software Review 283

SaaStr

AUGUST 7, 2021

I thought it might be helpful to assemble a checklist of 22 reasons I almost immediately pass on investing in start-ups that are still interesting. If I wouldn’t work for you … then I can’t help you recruit folks that will. You’re in sales. Recruit the VPs? Others bet on traction. And/or Late.

Sales Recruiting 339

Sales Recruiting Scale AWS Investment 339

SaaStr

MAY 6, 2021

A CRO owns and directs the strategy over a company’s revenue cycle, but there’s not a set standard for operational or management decisions: in addition to sales and sales development, they might be responsible for customer success, lead generation and pipelines, and even marketing and brand development. Is a CRO right for you?

Sales Hiring 232

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Interviewing Revenue 232

SaaStr

JANUARY 8, 2022

Scaling your sales team can be one of the hardest things to do in SaaS. What’s the best way to help your sales team navigate today’s changing markets and changing priorities? And what’s the right time to fill crucial sales leadership roles? 1 Buyers Expect Personalization in Outbound Sales. So now what?

Scale 228

Scale Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scaling 228

Sales Hacker

JUNE 10, 2021

There’s one thing recruiters are unanimous about. It’s that sales representatives are one of the toughest positions to hire for. The demand for sales reps is one of the highest of any job. Our recruitment team at EASI has gotten really good at this. Sales courses are largely absent from college curricula.

Sales Hiring 109

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Sales Interviewing 109

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. Justin Welsh | SVP Sales @ PatientPop. I was a local sales manager or regional manager.

Sales Recruiting 254

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Sales 254

Sales Hacker

OCTOBER 17, 2023

Chuck is the co-founder of Blueprint Expansion , a GTM roles recruiting firm that has helped over 50 VC-backed companies make amazing Sales, Marketing, & Customer Success hires. By using the power of AI to identify and engage the accounts and buying groups most likely to purchase.

Sales Hiring 109

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Interviewing SMB 109

SaaStr

MARCH 7, 2021

I thought it would be worth drilling down deeper into each of them, and sharing the learnings and mistakes: 1/ Spending less time fixing things, more time recruiting senior folks to own them. No one spends enough time recruiting as it is, after $1m ARR or so. Yes, you can manage the sales team yourself. You can do this.

Part-Time VPE 261

Part-Time VPE Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale 261

SaaStr

MARCH 22, 2022

I really appreciate you coming to talk about how to attract, hire, and build a more diverse sales team in your organization. So I’ve been building top-producing sales teams for a really, really long time. So over the years, I’ve watched many sales leaders go out and say, “Brian’s my top producer.

Sales Hiring 211

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Sales 211

SaaStr

DECEMBER 4, 2023

So backstage at SaaStr Annual this year, and in a number of other conversations since, I’ve had a chance to get a few quiet moments with maybe two dozen top CROs and VPs of Sales. Yes, macro issues come up, and how they have to sell to more stakeholders now, and sales cycles are longer. But the best long ago adapted.

Sales Recruiting 215

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Onboarding Sales 215

Tom Tunguz

FEBRUARY 2, 2021

Today, she advises and invests in companies on these topics and others. How you should you go about recruiting the right person? Throughout her time there, she scaled the SaaS company from $1M ARR to pre- IPO, along the way, creating the category of customer success software, and paving the way for Gainsight’s $1.1B

Scale 290

Scale Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Customer Success 290

SaaStr

MAY 1, 2021

Who can help me find that first VP of Sales? A lot of folks will want to invest in the next round of their startups. This does help with recruiting and partnerships. Many employees really do want to join one they see a well-regarded and popular VC has invested in. Let’s say a VC invests $3m into your start-up.

Sales Recruiting 279

Sales Recruiting Venture Capital Sales Hiring Investment 279

SaaStr

OCTOBER 5, 2020

There’s a common thinking that sales teams should be relatively high churn. That the bottom 15-20% of the sales team almost has to churn each year, because it’s survival of the fittest. At Salesforce, at Box, the bottom end of the sales team churns out each year. First, do sales reps really compete with each other?

Scale 286

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Sales 286

SaaStr

JULY 21, 2020

Your investors and others will learn a lot more hearing about sales from your VP of Sales, your CTO co-founder … and not you. This also will make you appear to be a much stronger manager. Especially, don’t try to talk over your weakest VPs and managers. Just assume none of your investors invest again.

Sales Recruiting 325

Sales Recruiting New CTO Scale CTO 325

Sales Hacker

AUGUST 27, 2024

He is a serial entrepreneur and successful investor with 20+ years of experience in founding, building, and investing in early-stage SaaS startups. Building a strong internal BDR team versus outsourcing sales efforts. The role of conviction and intuition in entrepreneurship and investing. Brought to you by IPS.

Outsourcing Services 103

Outsourcing Services Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Sales Outsourcing 103

SaaStr

MARCH 20, 2024

They discuss Sam’s learnings at Founders Fund, what the 2024 playbook looks like, hiring and motivating sales teams, and a handful of audience questions. For instance, Founders Fund doesn’t really invest in AI, health tech, or edtech, even if you’re growing 5x. On the sales side, people hired way too much.

Sales Hiring 249

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Headcount 249

SaaStr

JANUARY 25, 2021

And then, I would have invested more wisely in Year 1 especially. Not Hiring 2-3 Sales Reps to Start. More on that here: When You Hire Your First Sales Rep — Just Make Sure You Hire Two. I should have invested a little more in sales reps, more quickly, one we had some initial traction (see above).

Sales Recruiting 267

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale SaaS 267

SaaStr

MAY 14, 2023

Daniel, you grew to 3 million in ARR before you hired a VP of Sales. You had all the reps and SDRs reporting to you, managed it all yourself. How’d you manage all that? Daniel : We followed a lean start up approach to building our sales process. An engineering team and the sales team was me with a laptop.

Sales Hiring 228

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Payment Methods 228

Sales Hacker

JANUARY 20, 2022

Strong sales reps are the lifeblood of your business and how you choose to invest in them matters. For frontline sales managers, attributes like competency, quality of work, ease of execution, and length of contribution indicate reps’ overall job success, but you can’t rely on those inputs to tell you if they are personally satisfied.

Sales Recruiting 103

Sales Recruiting Scale Retention Sales 103

SaaStr

AUGUST 8, 2023

The team is typically highly cross-functional, working together with sales, product, engineering, and marketing, and the goal is to help the other teams make better decisions through data and financial modeling. This role can be recruited through headhunters or your network. Invest in next-gen finance tooling.

Scale 165

Scale Finance Outsourcing Services Sales Recruiting 165

Sales Hacker

DECEMBER 5, 2023

Tips for recruiting the best possible team members and how patience factors into that. 25:17) Writer’s PLG motion, including self-serve and sales-assisted, and how it’s used to turn small downloads into big enterprise accounts. (31:07) 31:07) A consultative sales process and messaging considerations. (36:56)

Sales Recruiting 99

Sales Recruiting Enterprise AI Banking 99