Are startup CEOs happy?
The best start-up CEOs are: driven unhappy if they are not building truly enjoy doing great things with their team are grateful for those on the journey with them want…
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Career Growth & Advice, Early, Q&A, Sales, ScaleThe Ultimate Guide For Scaling, Sales and Raising Capital in SaaS is Here!
Binge watch 25 of the greatest SaaS CEOs and Founders from companies like Box, Twilio, Zoom and more as they share their inside playbook.
Q&AHow can a SaaS CEO tell which customers are 10+ year customers and which aren’t?
I think it’s fairly easy. Look for: Are they running an entire division or group (or more) on your product? Is the use case mission critical — even if niche?…
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Q&ACan a good salesman sell anything?
Not really in SaaS. At least not well. The classic “Sell Me This Pen” test is still a good one, even in SaaS. There is no perfect answer, but it…
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Q&AWhat do VCs do when one of their portfolio companies go IPO?
Generally, they distribute the shares out to their own investors over a period of time (often 8 quarters, as a base case) after an IPO. They often try to sell…
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Q&AIs it a good idea for a person over 75 to start a new business?
I loved this session below with Eric Yuan about starting Zoom at 41. 41 doesn’t seem that old to me (and isn’t 75 for sure), but his real point was…
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Q&AHow much equity is fair for my co-founder that is leaving after 2 years and $50,000 invested in the company? The company is about to launch.
Stock contracts aside, the best you can do is what is fair. Here’s how I might think about it: $50,000 invested at say $1m valuation = 5% 10 year commitment…
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Q&AWhat are some ways to structure an enterprise SaaS deal when the customer is asking for exclusivity against their competitors?
Besides saying No, it’s worth considering a “Free Ice In Winter” approach. By that I mean, a short window of exclusivity for a top customer or partner is often OK…
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Should more companies going public follow Zoom’s example, doing it on expectations for GROWTH instead of for profitability?
Well, Zoom did both. It is both one of the fastest growing SaaS companies of all time AND one of the most capital efficient relative to its peer group. What’s…
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Q&AWhy do big companies buy small companies instead of competing?
Time, and sometimes, talent. Yes, any top-tier Big Tech Company can clearly compete with any start-up. Be under no illusions that they can’t. They can grab 5–25 extra engineers (unlike…
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Q&AHow do enterprises decide which software vendor to sign a deal with?
75%-90% of the time, enterprises have already made a tentative decision which vendor to choose before they pick up the phone or hit the Contact Me button: In an established…
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Q&AWhat are rules your company has out into place to make meetings more effective?
A few things that do help IMHE: A written agenda required for all meetings. No meetings without one. A Principally Responsible Individual for all decisions and actions. For every item…
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When is SalesForce going to buy Oracle?
I think it is unlikely. Salesforce had several discussions over the years re: selling itself to Oracle — when Salesforce was much smaller. But times have changed, the Cloud has…
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Q&ACan you elaborate on the year 2, 3, N referral partner commission for enterprise B2B SaaS?
The biggest difference is the goals. If a partner program’s goal is to align 2 sales teams, then commissions really should only be paid on Year 1 deals closed together….
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We are a SaaS company. A larger partner of ours who sells a complimentary product wants to have their sales reps sell our product alongside theirs. They want 25-50% of the first year’s revenue. Should we do it?
Yes, probably. The simplest way to think of payments to partners is as a marketing cost. The reality is, it’s tough to acquire a good customer for < 20%-25% of…
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