SaaStr

JANUARY 3, 2024

It send the stock price up 112% over the past 12 months! NRR Remains Solid at 110%, But Down From 130% in 2021 NRR remains healthy, but down materially from the Go Go Days of 2021, when at $700m ARR, Elastic had 130% NRR. Elastic has seen continual growth in customer count, from 13,000 in 2021 to 20,700 at the end of 2023.

ChatGPT 224

ChatGPT AI Search Scale Sales Hiring 224

SaaStr

APRIL 26, 2023

Self-serve products can and should be quite profitable at scale. Most of the website / presence growth came from price increases, which saw limited churn as a result. Churn was modest from their price increase, leading to material growth. Large mark-down for its $400m acquisition of Tock in 2021. A tough metric.

Scale 229

Scale SMB Churn Pricing 229

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 8, 2021

With too many examples from SaaStr Annual 2021 to call out specifically, here are 2 “Cloud talks plus decks” that I can imagine the Self-Taught Founder relying upon: David Sacks On SaaS Org Charts. Example Referenceable Slide + Full Deck : Mark Roberge On The Science of Scaling. Full Session YouTube. Full YouTube Session.

Scale 311

Scale Cloud Forecasting Pricing 311

SaaStr

DECEMBER 27, 2023

Or at least, maybe like many, tougher times meant holding the line on costs and people, leading to even more efficiency. ARPU was up +28% from 2022 over 2021, and another 6% the past 12 months on top of that. But at scale, even the slightly less long version of the tail is where the money is. Churn Stable.

Scale 229

Scale AWS Azure Cloud 229

yoursales

JANUARY 29, 2021

Sales Stack 2021. Sales Tools for Professional Sales. SALES STACK 2020: THE TOOLS SALES STACK 2020: THE TOOLS. Sales technology for professional sales will be more important than ever. In 2020 almost every single Sales Professional was forced inside. Same goes for Sales Professionals.

Scale 104

Scale Payment Methods Payment Solutions Sales Recruiting 104

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 24, 2021

The SaaS sales model seems so well-established, as hundreds of founders build their businesses and raise funding. Mark Roberge, Founder of Stage 2 Capital and Senior Lecturer at Harvard Business School, shares insights from his years of experience into common SaaS sales missteps and how you can avoid them.

Sales Hiring 194

Sales Hiring Scale Compensation Sales 194

SaaStr

MARCH 19, 2021

The Cloud is expanding and moving forward at a phenomenal rate, so we invited the team at Bessemer Venture Partners back to SaaStr to unveil their latest findings in the 2021 State of the Cloud. As of January 2021, there were over 527 private unicorns with a total cumulative value of over $1.9 Nail it Before You Scale it .

Cloud 193

Cloud Scale Payment Methods Payment Solutions 193

Buffer Resources

NOVEMBER 7, 2023

For one, she has built a stable and viable business, achieving six figures in revenue every year for the past five years and even bringing in multiple-six-figures in 2021 when she expanded her business with subcontractors. This was 2021, when there was a lot of uncertainty and struggle in the freelance community.

Scale 122

Scale Scaling Payment Solutions Payment Services 122

SaaStr

MAY 28, 2024

If you’ve read SaaStr or have been around for the last decade, you might be familiar with some of the repeated GTM mistakes founders tend to make, but the world of hiring, people, scaling, and workplace expectations are significantly different today than they were before March 2020. They weren’t getting any leads.

Sales Hiring 247

Sales Hiring Scale AI Search AI 247

OpenView Labs

NOVEMBER 4, 2021

Software buying has evolved and SaaS companies are increasingly moving to a usage-based pricing model. Usage models correspond with faster net expansion and continued growth at scale. . >> I along with fellow OpenView Partner Sanjiv Kalevar surveyed nearly 600 SaaS companies to find out how they priced their products in 2021.

Pricing 60

Pricing Scale Subscription Payment Features 60

SaaStr

JUNE 28, 2023

So there was a quiet SaaS IPO you may have missed in the craziness of 2021 — SEMRush, a tool your marketing department quite likely uses to keep track of the performance of your SEO and marketing site. The classic “high-end of self-service” price point. Still, always helpful to see how any leader does free to paid at scale.

Scale 201

Scale AWS Scaling Revenue 201

SaaStr

MAY 3, 2023

Scaling a company comes with all kinds of hiccups and failures. Sometimes the best way to avoid hard-to-fix mistakes is by hearing how other people flubbed it while they were scaling. For a quick rundown, Gainsight is the leading platform for customer success. Many people had similar experiences to Gainsight in 2021 and 2022.

Sales Hiring 175

Sales Hiring Scale Pricing Customer Success 175

SaaStr

JANUARY 11, 2023

And while it’s stock price is down from its 2021 peaks, it’s still up 2x since its 2020 IPO. Docebo’s pricing is on the “corporate” side of LMS. It doesn’t compete at the bottom of the market, and targets top logos with a reasonably priced product. Billion with a sales-driven motion ….

Scale 337

Scale Pricing Scaling Enterprise 337

SaaStr

APRIL 29, 2021

Well, there are probably at least 3 core true-isms with customer buying: For a product much more than $299 a month, most prospects want to talk to someone before they buy. For almost any product that requires real business process change, most prospects will want to talk to someone before they buy. That makes no sense in 2021+.

Scale 269

Scale Scaling Enterprise Pricing 269

SaaStr

OCTOBER 30, 2021

Gorgias is the leading contact center for e-commerce and it’s been a fun one to track at SaaS, from 1,000 to 3,000 to now 7,000 customers. Their CEO will join us at SaaSr Scale 2021 on December 15 to talk about using data to get to 10,000 SMB customers! Your sales process should not be a closed box with little insights. .

Scale 261

Scale Sales Hiring Sales SMB 261

SaaStr

APRIL 5, 2022

Now, Gartner’s survey looks back at a period without IRL events, so email looked to be the #1 channel that took events’ place in 2021. With no budget going to IRL events in 2021, marketers pushed more into email in particular. But perhaps the biggest reminder is this: At Scale, You Probably Have to Do Everything.

Scale 273

Scale Mobile Cloud Pricing 273

SaaStr

MAY 10, 2023

And while that growth level is a bit off the crazy pace of 2021 , it’s still mighty impressive in the current macro environment. HubSpot’s operating margins have scaled into the double-digits the past two quarters for the first time. A reminder of just how important being multi-product is at scale.

Scale 253

Scale SMB Headcount New CTO 253

OpenView Labs

JANUARY 12, 2021

Back in another lifetime—exactly one year ago—Kyle and I offered up our pricing transformations for 2020. As we enter the post-pandemic economy and get used to the “new normal,” we’d like to look back on our 2020 predictions and share our thoughts on what’s in store for 2021. Pricing as a part of the customer experience (CX).

Pricing 53

Pricing Scale Outsourced Development Market Segmentation 53

SaaStr

JULY 27, 2022

Boterri’s company Accel invested in PayFit in 2017 and again in 2021. They built their sales funnel in the same fashion to empower customers with autonomous product discovery and conversions. Smaller organizations don’t typically respond to the long sales cycle or constant conversations and negotiations that an enterprise needs.

SMB 196

SMB Sales Hiring Scale B2C 196

SaaStr

APRIL 2, 2023

This thought is usually accompanied by a vague statement like “this person isn’t scaling.” Mistake: Not scaling based upon leading indicators We’ve had 3 periods in history where we scaled up way too fast: Early on, when we thought the enterprise opportunity for Gainsight’s Customer Success product was huge after closing *1* enterprise deal!

Sales Hiring 264

Sales Hiring Scale Scaling Customer Success 264

SaaStr

DECEMBER 27, 2020

But New Relic has continued to scale, crossing $650,000,000 in ARR (or so) and a $4B market cap. Slow growth means a low multiple. It’s the secret to scaling effectively. This is fairly common as companies go more enterprise, and the sales team especially wants to limit the use of free accounts and pilots.

Scale 302

Scale Outsourced Development SMB Cloud 302

SaaStr

JULY 20, 2022

Weave started off as a dental ERP and comms platform (including VoIP / phone), and then expanded beyond that as it scaled. It IPO’d in November 2021 and today is doing $130m ARR, growing a respectable 30% year-over-year. It’s a tough outcome for a team that is working hard to scale well into the nine figures of ARR.

SaaS Payments 242

SaaS Payments Scale Payment Methods Payments 242

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 20, 2023

Beyond multiples, many Cloud companies faced a deluge of headwinds that impacted business fundamentals… Lengthening sales cycles Tightening customer budgets It was no surprise that SaaS IPOs came to a screeching halt. That’s definitely a departure from the heights of 2020 and 2021. They’re being rewarded. Why are they doing this?

Cloud 247

Cloud Payments Software Review Payment Solutions 247

Tom Tunguz

DECEMBER 31, 2023

We also see more ARR-based web3 businesses achieving scale. Record inflows into tokens fuel all-time highs in Bitcoin, Solana, & higher performance L1s who offer better price/performance to market. The fundraising market thaws, but at materially lower prices than the first half of 2022. 3 KnowBe4 4.6 6 Forge Rock 2.3

AI Search 219

AI Search AI Scale Headcount 219

Neil Patel

JULY 12, 2021

For example, brands could create an automatic lead generation funnel that gathers an email address, sends a recorded demo, then invites the prospect to schedule a live demo. Pricing starts at $150 per month for unlimited emails, SMS, tracking, and technical support. Basically, it makes personalized messages simple.

Payment Methods 145

Payment Methods Scale Payments Marketing 145

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 12, 2022

The main issue is price. And in the Boom Times of 2021 and such, VCs took a lot more risk across the board. They see it as a key differentiator to win as you scale. Growing too slowly after Initial Traction at a minimum means a lot of VCs will rule you out at any price. And the key is, it really varies from VC to VC.

Scale 335

Scale Sales Recruiting Machine Learning Artificial Intelligence 335

ChurnZero

SEPTEMBER 8, 2021

In response, some organizations have slatted in-person events for the tail end of 2021. . Top Three In-Person Conferences for Customer Success Professionals to Attend in 2021. SaaStr Annual 2021 – September 27-29, 2021 San Mateo, CA. Their goal is to help everyone scale faster and with less stress and more success.

Scale 95

Scale Leadership Technology Customer Success 95

SaaStr

MAY 10, 2024

So HubSpot had a great quarter, despite there being many challenges in the sales and marketing segments overall in the past 18 months: $2.5B This is probably what most of you are seeing for pure-play B2B SaaS sales, too. What about outside of sales and marketing software etc? But … that doesn’t mean it got easier.

B2C 220

B2C Mobile B2B Market Segmentation 220

OpenView Labs

JANUARY 13, 2022

Welcome to the third edition of the Pricing Transformations series. This year we look back at 2021 and forward to 2022, measuring how our past predictions have stood up to another tumultuous year and laying out what you can expect in 2022. Pricing Transformations in 2020. Pricing Transformations in 2021.

Pricing 82

Pricing Payment Services SaaS Payments Payment Solutions 82

OpenView Labs

NOVEMBER 30, 2021

In 2021 the ‘ Rule of 40’ died, according to our latest 2021 Financial & Operating Benchmarks report that launched last week. . The ‘haves’, defined by growing quickly out of the gate and then maintaining 50% or faster revenue growth at significant scale, have seen their valuations skyrocket over the years.

Payment Services 80

Payment Services Benchmarks SaaS Payments Merchant Services 80

SaaStr

JULY 21, 2022

At this point, any founder in SaaS should know the public markets have fallen 50% or so from the peaks in 2021. Venture markets were so hot in 2021, that many SaaS founders could sell a few million dollars worth of their shares even in a Series A. in secondary sales. And the amounts smaller. More on that here.

Marketing 262

Marketing Scale Acquisition Pricing 262

SaaStr

MARCH 11, 2022

As per current trajectory – high likelihood of H2 acceleration in ecommerce sales. Multiples are too low today, given that the best SaaS and Cloud companies not only are growing faster than ever, but are even accelerating at scale. Seed investors that see multiples reverting to the past are becoming much more price conscious.

Scale 267

Scale SaaS Cloud Pricing 267

Tom Tunguz

NOVEMBER 18, 2021

Sales Efficiency. -. Multi-year deals are much more common at price points greater than $150k. In addition, Samsara enjoys strong and improving accrual sales efficiency of 0.70. Congratulations to the Samsara team on building an incredible company with a unique go-to-market strategy and achieving incredible scale so quickly.

CTO Hire 356

CTO Hire CTO Coach Benchmarks Scale 356

SaaStr

AUGUST 29, 2022

10 Lessons Learned Scaling to $1B Valuation with Drift’s Co-founders : Reaching unicorn status is nice validation, but the luster fades when founders can’t navigate the hidden challenges that come with uncharted territory. Scaling Revenue in 2022: What’s the Same and What’s Different? What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

Scale 247

Scale Sales Hiring Marketplace as a Service B2B 247

SaaSOptics

MAY 2, 2022

There are several different ways to successfully launch and scale a SaaS company. The two most common go-to-market strategies are sales-led growth (SLG) and, more recently, product-led growth (PLG). . In a sales-led model, sales processes and teams are the primary drivers of revenue growth. Image Source: SaaStr 2021 ).

Scale 97

Scale Sales Hiring Underperforming Technical Team Sales 97

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 6, 2023

If you’re selling sales and marketing software, like Zoominfo, it can seem a lot tougher than 12-18 months ago. On top of that, inflation and price increases are eating into overall IT budgets. As compared to late 2020 and 2021, when change was the name of the game.

Merchant Services 267

Merchant Services Azure Software AWS 267

Sales Hacker

FEBRUARY 12, 2021

See what the top 10 platforms you should be looking at in 2021 are to make an informed decision for your business needs. If you’re familiar with what a CRM is already, then you intuitively know that an enterprise CRM is basically a CRM solution tailored to larger (enterprise-level) companies with complex processes and large sales teams.

Payment Solutions 85

Payment Solutions Enterprise Scale Payments 85