Blog Posts, Early, Leadership, Q&A, Sales
Q: Dear SaaStr: Should a Startup Founder Handle Sales Themself When First Getting Started? The answer is yes – 95% of the time. The “best” sequence for building a repeatable…
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Blog Posts, Growth, Hiring, Q&A, Sales
You can back into it. First, figure out how much revenue you need to close in the next twelve months. Because that’s more than now. Second, calculate a reasonable attainable…
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Blog Posts, Customer Success, Growth, Marketing, Q&A
Q: Dear SaaStr: What Percent of My Revenue Should Come from Referrals and Word of Mouth? Ultimately, almost all top software companies end up getting 20-50% or so of their…
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Blog Posts, Q&A
Q: I’m starting a job at a SaaS company after years in consumer apps. What should I know that might not be obvious to a newcomer? You have to love…
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Growth, Hiring, Human Resources, Metrics, Q&A
Q: At what stage should SaaS founders fully stop being individual contributors? I’ve come up with 2 rough rules here to avoid stalling out: Try to have a complete 1.0…
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Blog Posts, Early, Marketing, Q&A, SaaS Product Pricing, Sales
Q: Dear SaaStr: Should I Publish My Pricing? If you aren’t sure — then yes. Transparent pricing has many advantages: It makes the sales process simpler. It allows prospects and…
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Q&A
Q: What’s the proper way to commission a multi-year SaaS sale with increasing ACV each year? There’s no perfect answer here, but at least until you are at $10m+ ARR,…
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Blog Posts, Early, Fundraising, Leadership, Q&A
Q: What is the meanest thing that venture capitalists can do to founders? Even today, a lot of founders worry about raising VC capital. They hear the stories about how…
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Growth, Hiring, Q&A, Sales
I’ve written a lot about this, but for most start-ups, you can boil it down to two criteria any first VP of Sales just has to meet: Has she built…
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Blog Posts, Career Growth & Advice, Early, Leadership, Q&A
Q: Dear SaaStr: My Co-Founder is Threatening to Quit Unless I Give Him More Equity; what should I do? Generally, this is the last, best chance to fix things. Founder…
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Customer Success, Marketing, Marketing, Q&A
Do whatever is best for the customer. It’s incredibly frustrating when a customer cancels, especially, one you’ve put a ton of work into. But the thing is, it’s not necessarily…
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Blog Posts, Compensation, Early, Leadership, Q&A
Q: How does a CEO/founder/owner pick their salary? I’ll share my stories. In my first start-up, we raised $9m in our seed round — a large first round, but the…
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Blog Posts, Career Growth & Advice, Early, Leadership, Marketing, Q&A
Q: Dear SaaStr: How Do I Compete with a Company that has Unlimited Capital — and I Don’t? Do they have a strong brand? If not, it may not matter….
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Blog Posts, Early, Metrics, Sales
Q: What are some tricks software companies use to manipulate churn metrics? “Churn” is a surprisingly imprecise term. Some ways SaaS companies “manipulate” churn, which may be 100% legitimate in…
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Marketing, Marketing, Q&A
Q: If I White-label my SaaS, will it hurt me on branding my own company? Just do it. If it’s easy to do. Lots of folks agonize over white-labelling. The…
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