Notion at $11 Billion: The Art of Growing Into Your Valuation — And After 14 Years, Into One Of The Next Great B2B IPOs
The numbers tell one of the most important stories in B2B right now. Notion just kicked off an employee share sale at an $11 billion valuation. That’s just 10% above their October 2021 price—after four years. But here’s what changed: revenue grew ~20x....
Dear SaaStr: What Do You Do When Your Startup is Not Growing Anymore?
Dear SaaStr: What Do You Do When Your Startup is Not Growing Anymore? First, be honest about why. You can blame it on macro issues if you want, or on the competition over promising, or whatever — but if growth has radically decelerated, it’s likely because you...
Even A Slightly Too High Burn Rate Can Get Out of Control
There’s a pattern I see again and again, probably with 30% of venture-backed start-ups, maybe 40%. Their burn rate sneaks up on them, and becomes a bit out of control — without feeling like it. This usually doesn’t happen in the very early days,...
Dear SaaStr: What’s the #1 Way I Can Accelerate My Career Growth?
Dear SaaStr: What’s the #1 Way I Can Accelerate My Career Growth? My uber-learnings: Find the best boss you can; and Take on every initiative, project, task, and endeavor you possibly can from her. And work for them for a while. Long enough to get promoted once,...
Dear SaaStr: For High Dollar Vertical SaaS, Does The VP of Sales Need Domain Expertise?
Dear SaaStr: If you were hiring a head of sales for a high-priced, niche B2B SaaS product, would you focus on general B2B SaaS sales experience or on market/customer knowledge, assuming it will be very difficult to find a candidate with both? This is the scenario when...
Dear SaaStr: What Are The Top 3 Criteria for Hiring Your First Head of Sales?
We’ve talked a lot on SaaStr about hiring that first VP of Sales. But what if you can’t find the right person, and you’ve spent months looking? What risks should you take when you’ve realized Ms or Mr Perfect just isn’t going to happen...
Dear SaaStr: How Much Vacation is Normal for an Early Stage Startup CEO?
Dear SaaStr: How Much Vacation is Normal for an Early Stage Startup CEO? I’ve gotten worse at this. I think many of us have. 996 matters as founders. The pace of change, the scale of competition, is like nothing we’ve ever seen before now, in the Age of...
Crunchbase: We’re At The Highest Level of Unicorn Production in 3+ Years
The data is in. And it’s remarkable. And it’s what we’ve all been feeling and seeing in venture. The Unicorns Really Are Back. Back to The Highest Level In 3+ Years. October 2025 just became the biggest month for unicorn creation in over three...
Dear SaaStr: How Many More Junior Marketers Should you Hire Before Hiring a VP of Marketing?
Dear SaaStr: How Many More Junior Marketers Should you Hire Before Hiring a VP of Marketing? Unlike many positions, I say 0 if possible. In fact, one of the 10 most unforced errors I see founders make is hire someone too junior to get marketing going. If you are,...
Dear SaaStr: How Did You Get Your First Major Customers?
Dear SaaStr: How Did You Get Your First Major Customers? Secret here: every story is different. In my first start-up, it was pure hustle. We had a concentrated number of high dollar customers, so I did “outbound”. I found the right decision makers, got on the phone,...
Dear SaaStr: How Many Options Should I Give to the First Non-Founder Employees?
Dear SaaStr: How Many Options Should I Give to the First Non-Founder Employees of they are making below market but non-zero salaries? Here’s the tough part. It’s really hard. What you should do is give them say 3x their forgone salary in stock — 3x to account for...
Dear SaaStr: Our VC Is Encouraging Us to Hire Aggressively and Increase the Burn Rate. Should We Listen to Them?
Dear SaaStr: Our VC Is Encouraging Us to Hire Aggressively and Increase the Burn Rate. Should We Listen to Them? In my experience, about 66-70% of the time this is bad advice, especially if it is coming from a Very Large VC. Not always — but more often than...
Dear SaaStr: What Were the Biggest Mistakes You Made Getting Your Startups Going?
Dear SaaStr: What Were the Biggest Mistakes You Made Getting Your Startups Going? The biggest two mistakes I made, I made twice, maybe thrice. They were: One, starting with too incomplete a management team. In my first start-up, while the core 3 co-founders were...
Dear SaaStr: Is It Ridiculous To Call Yourself the CEO When Your Startup is Tiny?
Dear SaaStr: Is It Ridiculous To Call Yourself the CEO When Your Startup is Tiny? I used to feel that way, at least a bit. I used to look at tiny little startups and wince when a founder went around talking about himself as “CEO”. But then I had to learn how to Sell...
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