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After I Sold My Company, I Couldn’t Make Decisions Again for a While
What’s the toughest part of running a startup? A partial list: Recruiting. This is always hard, forever. Co-founder Conflict. Hopefully, you don’t have this. If you do, boy it’s hard. Almost running out of money. Happens to almost all of us. Not fun. Loneliness at the top. Tough indeed. Having to rebuild the team every…
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How Shopify Implements AI Across Sales and Product with Mike Tamir, Head of AI at Shopify, and Rudina Seseri, Managing Partner at Glasswing Ventures
Mike Tamir, Head of AI at Shopify, and Rudina Seseri, founder and Managing Partner at Glasswing Ventures, level-set about where we are in the cycle for Enterprises adopting AI and the critical work being done at Shopify to leverage AI and solve real problems.
Dear SaaStr: How Do I Actually Start a Successful SaaS Company?
Dear SaaStr: How Do I Start a Successful SaaS Company? I think there are approximately 2 ways to get a new SaaS app off the ground: Option 1: Hustle into The Enterprise. In almost every category of software, there are gaps. Painful gaps. Generally, several gaps that any buyer has and would pay, say, $5k…
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Join the CEOs of Bill, Procore, Klaviyo, Apollo, Attentive, Kong and More at 2024 SaaStr Annual!!
We’re gearing up for 2024 SaaStrEuropa.com in London on June 4-5, which will be awesome. 3,500+ of the best in SaaS and Cloud together in London! See You There! But then comes The Biggest Non-Vendor SaaS Event of the Year! SaaStrAnnual.com 2024 on Sep 10-12 in SF Bay!! 12,000+ of the best founders, CEOs, CTOs,…
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More and More SaaS Startups Have Fallen Out of Product-Market Fit
So there’s one topic you have to be ruthlessly honest about as a founder: are you falling out of product-market fit? The reason you have to be ruthless is while sometimes falling into product-market fit can happen relatively fast, e.g. with a magic feature … falling out takes time. It takes time for customers to churn,…
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Dear SaaStr: When Do VCs Try To Replace Founders as CEOs?
Dear SaaStr: When Do VCs Try To Replace Founders as CEOs? You’re worried about a bunch of VCs replacing you. That’s fair. You should be. It happens. Regularly — but not usually. A few high-level things to think about. First, if you really screw up, shouldn’t you be replaced? Second, if you don’t end up…
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5 Interesting Learnings from Veeva at $2.5 Billion in ARR
So the #1 OG vertical SaaS leader is Veeva. A core CRM, data and Cloud platform for the life sciences industry, it started off as a “Salesforce for Pharma” and expanded from there. It raised less than $10m before it IPO’d, and fast forward to day, it’s at $2.5 Billion in ARR, and is very…
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Dear SaaStr: What Happens if a VC Loses All Their Money on an Investment?
Dear SaaStr: What Happens if a VC Loses All Their Money on an Investment? It’s OK — if it’s not too much. As long as the founders did everything they possibly could to make it work. Everything. And were honest. There are two types of losses for VCs and professional investors: losses than fit into…
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12 Things You’ll Look Back On in SaaS … And Regret (Updated)
A little while back on LinkedIn and Twitter we put together a list of things that later, once you are successful, even very successful, you’ll regret. It got a lot of engagement from the SaaS veterans out there, so I thought it would be worth digging in more on each point: Regrets are different than…
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Top 5 Lessons Learned from Databricks’ Journey from $400M to $1.5B+ with former VP of Product Nadim Hossain
Databricks had an incredible scale-up from $400M to $1.5B+ during former VP of Product Nadim Hossain’s time there. The company has gone from 1600 employees to over 5500 and most recently crossed the $2B ARR mark. Nadim shares the principles behind the SaaS company’s massive growth.
Dear SaaStr: As a CEO New to Sales, How Can I Get Better at Closing Deals?
Dear SaaStr: How Can I Get Better at Closing Deals? If it’s very early, hire 1 or ideally 2 sales reps who you’d personally buy from. You’ll all learn from each other how to close better, and faster. The #1 trick to making sure your first sales reps work out? Only hire sales reps you'd…
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Thinking of Stepping Down as Founder-CEO? You Just Might Be Asked Back
So this is the time of the year when founders step down. Often quietly. Folks recover a bit from the end-of-year push, reflect, and sometimes … decide it’s time to bring in someone new. A CEO to take things to the next level. Etc. And even more of us think about it. Heck, I’ve thought…
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Dear SaaStr: How Do I Craft a Winning Investor Deck for an Early-Stage Startup?
Dear SaaStr: How Do I Craft a Winning Investor Deck for an Early-Stage Startup? Here’s my #1 piece of advice: Get it all down to One Slide. "How to Create a Compelling Investor Deck: The Power of the First Slide" pic.twitter.com/AyyS7lHATz — SaaStr (@saastr) March 22, 2024 With 6-7 points on that slide. Not more. …
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Top 10 Learnings from Todd McKinnon, CEO of Okta on Scaling To The First $30m ARR (Updated)
Todd McKinnon, CEO of Okta, a ways back joined us for the first time joined us at our first big digital event, SaaStr Scale. It was a great deep dive on what it’s really like scaling an emerging leader in a category everyone previously thought was small. Through the magic of AI, we edited down…
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Dear SaaStr: What Are The Top 5 Things I Should Know Before Starting a SaaS Startup?
Dear SaaStr: What Are The Top 5 Things I Should Know Before Starting a SaaS Startup? My Top 5: It will take you at least 24 months to really get anywhere. Everyone mentally budgets 10–12 months. It’s never enough. At least, not to get enough paying customers from Code Zero. A little more here: https://www.saastr.com/if-youre-……
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Popular Q&A
How To Reverse-Engineer a $100M Exit: SaaStr on My First Million Pod
How do you reverse-engineer your first million as a SaaS startup founder? SaaStr founder and CEO Jason Lemkin chats with Sam Parr on the popular YouTube channel and podcast My First Million about what’s required to make it on the map for a $100M exit and then reverse engineers the steps to get there.
Rule 1: New minimum is $400K per employee
Rule 2: Go multi-product
Rule 3: Your second product must be bigger than your first product
Cheat code: Double your prices
Rule 4: 30% of your revenue is international
Rule 5: Localize your product
Cheat code: Remove friction
Rule 6: 100% net revenue retention
Rule 7: Don’t raise double digit millions
Dear SaaStr: What Was the Toughest Rejection You Ever Had in Sales?
Dear SaaStr: What Was the Toughest Rejection You Ever Had in Sales? The hardest rejection I’ve had in sales was around renewals. Especially ones I thought we really had earned. But still lost. In particular, in the early days of EchoSign / Adobe Sign, we had a...
Why the Future of Customer Success, Sales and Marketing Has Changed For Good: Ask-Me-Anything Part 2 with SaaStr CEO and Founder Jason Lemkin
In part one of this week’s Ask-Me-Anything (AMA) with SaaStr founder and CEO Jason Lemkin, he answered the community’s questions about whether all anyone cares about is AI anymore, investor appetites going into 2024, vertical SaaS, and thriving as a solo founder....
Is AI the Only Thing in SaaS that Anyone Cares About Anymore? Ask-Me-Anything Part 1 with SaaStr CEO and Founder Jason Lemkin
In the first part of this open Ask-Me-Anything (AMA), Jason shares his thoughts on the current state of sales and marketing, if anyone really cares about anything other than AI anymore, how to hire great partners, and breaking out of a crowded ecosystem.
Doubling Down: Jay Levy Managing Partner at Zelkova Ventures
"Doubling Down" is a new series where we hear from top B2B SaaS investors on their most recent activities and takes on the current market. Kicking us off is Jay Levy, Managing Partner at Zelkova Ventures. #1. What’s your most recent disclosed investment? Why did you...
Dear SaaStr: Can an Entrepreneur Back Out of a Signed Term Sheet Without Damaging Their Reputation?
Dear SaaStr: Can an entrepreneur back out of a signed term sheet without damaging their reputation? In my experience — Yes, probably. As a founder, you can back out of a term sheet if something is off, or even if you just get another offer you prefer. There is a lot...