Dear SaaStr: What Were The First Five Hires You Made After Product-Market Fit?
Dear SaaStr: What Were The First Five Hires You Made After Product-Market Fit? My first 5 hires at Adobe Sign / EchoSign, beyond the core founding+ team, once we had paying customers and first, if early, product-marketing fit: #1: Full-time sales rep at $8k-ish MRR....
Dear SaaStr: How Many Sales Reps Do I Need?
Dear SaaStr: How Many Sales Reps Do I Need? More than you probably would think. You can back into how many sales reps you’ll need in SaaS: First, figure out how much sales-driven revenue you need to close in the next twelve months. Because that’s more than now....
Dear SaaStr: As a Founder, When Did You Realize You Were Limiting Your Company’s Growth and Success?
Dear SaaStr: As a Founder, When Did You Realize You Were Limiting Your Company’s Growth and Success? As we approached $10m ARR, we were doing very well: growing 100%, cash-flow positive, with 100%+ NRR. But I did see that certain of my weaknesses still were...
The Top 10 Mistakes I See In The CRO / VP of Sales Hiring Process
So we’ve spent a ton of time over the years on SaaS talking about hiring a great VP of Sales / CRO. Not only because it really matters, but because hiring the wrong one can set you back a year — or longer. So I thought I’d come back to the classic...
Dear SaaStr: What Role Do Founders Play Once They Hire an Outside CEO?
Dear SaaStr: What Role Do Founders Play Once They Hire an Outside CEO? Let me take a slightly different take on the question. Maybe you are really asking – “Am I still on the hook if we hire a ‘real’ CEO to run the company? ‘Cause...
The Three Most Important Things To Look For When You Hire Your First VP of Sales
You just can't hire a VP of Sales that hasn't themselves hired a few great reps before At least 2 good sales reps before, that hit or exceeded quotas pic.twitter.com/8f0qiUVPxV — Jason ✨👾SaaStr.Ai✨ Lemkin (@jasonlk) February 10, 2024 We’ve talked a...
You’ll Know if That New VP is Going to Fail at the First Board Meeting. Here Are The Clear Tells.
When a new CRO / VP Sales shows up to the first board meeting and doesn't know: – The top accounts cold– The top deals in flight cold– Their team and leaders cold– The top deals at risk cold There's like 0% chance it will work out...
Yes, Your CRO / VP of Sales Also Has to Be a Great Salesperson Themselves
"Hiring a seasoned CRO / VP Sales can make sense. But you have to make sure they still want to be … a CRO / VP Sales. That they still want to spend 100% of their time selling. Not being a COO, or President, etc. Not everyone really wants to sell...
10 Crystal Clear Signs Your VP of Sales Just Isn’t Going to Work Out
"The #1 thing that undermines confidence in a CRO: Unexpected Bad News. A CRO should have real visibility into the new few months. They may come in a bit above or below plan. But there shouldn't be massive variances. If so, the plan was Hope-ium."...
The Problem With Junior Marketing Hires (And What a True VP Costs)
"Once you have any customers at all, hire a head of marketing. You really can't hire a VP of Marketing too early. If they just get you another 20%-50% leads, they'll more than pay for yourself. But that doesn't mean hire someone junior that can't...
Dear SaaStr: When Is the Best Time for a Co-Founder to Leave a Startup?
Dear SaaStr: When Is the Best Time for a Co-Founder to Leave a Startup? The best time to quit is the earlier of (x) 6 months from the time you’ve decided to move on or (y) at any time when the other founders ask you to. If you’ve truly decided to leave, then it’s...
Great VPs of Sales Never Hide from a Miss
I've never seen a great VP of Sales hide from a miss — Jason ✨👾SaaStr.Ai✨ Lemkin (@jasonlk) August 26, 2023 We’ve talked a lot on SaaStr over the years about how to hire a great VP of Sales — and how to course-correct if you’ve made a mis-hire. The two...
Dear SaaStr: How Do We Close Bigger Deals?
Dear SaaStr: How Do We Close Bigger Deals? If you already have a few bigger deals under your belt, but most are smaller … a few higher-level suggestions: #1. Hire a Very Good CRO / VP of Sales that has sold at your “high end” price point. They will be much better at...
All Platforms Have Their Favorite Partners. Be One Of Them If You Can.
Recently I was catching up with an exec from a B2B company well in excess of $100m ARR. One of the key platforms their app integrates with has started to … slow down their access. Slow down access to new features, to semi-documented APIs. Slow down access to...
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