Clouded Judgement

JANUARY 12, 2024

Many companies raised rounds in 2021 who thought they had product market fit. Or who thought their market was 10x bigger than it actually was. For founders - it’s perfectly ok to come to the conclusion that you don’t have product market fit. Have these conversations today.

Cloud 284

Cloud Venture Capital Acquisition Metrics 284

User Pilot

FEBRUARY 4, 2023

Then you can analyze the performance of different segments and do a cohort analysis to check for product-market fit. Companies that prioritize growth analytics in their product growth strategy will see sustainable revenue growth. Growth metrics are valuable for product teams, marketing teams, and UI/UX designers.

Acquisition 98

Acquisition Retention Churn Metrics 98

SaaStr

APRIL 17, 2024

They grew like crazy when they found product-market-fit and raised a big Series A and B. Build trust, which is essential during an acquisition. In general, your valuation is a hard floor on a good acquisition price. You’d essentially be walking away from a $100M acquisition in that moment. What happens now?

Underperforming Technical Team 164

Underperforming Technical Team Data Development Team Review Technical Review 164

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 9, 2024

Going-To-Market With Budget Constraints Giancarlo joined Zapier as CRO when it was a more mature business, and admittedly, later than many hire their first CRO. So when’s the right time to invest more in sales and marketing when we’re all trying to become radically efficient ? The product becomes your sales team.

Scale 251

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Marketing 251

User Pilot

AUGUST 6, 2023

A consistent omnichannel customer experience can improve satisfaction , build loyalty , drive acquisition, increase retention , boost LTV, and help you make data-driven decisions. User acquisition. We practice what we preach at Userpilot which is why we have a tight-knit and constantly growing Product Marketing Facebook group.

Investment 88

Investment Banking Social Media Customer Lifetime Value 88

SaaSOptics

MAY 19, 2022

What Is Customer Acquisition? Customer Acquisition is the process of acquiring new customers in a business. Not only is it one of the main drivers of revenue growth for early-stage companies, but it’s a primary goal for SaaS businesses across market stages. What is a Customer Acquisition Strategy? Plain and simple.

Acquisition 59

Acquisition Scale Strategy Software Review 59

SaaStr

APRIL 4, 2023

If you don’t want your company defeated by change, you need to adapt your Go-To-Market strategy at every stage of growth. Managing Partner of CIPIO Partners, Rolan Dennert, shares how companies need to readjust and rethink GTM fit — and even product market fit — from time to time. Are you seeking lots of small deals?

Scale 220

Scale Strategy Scaling Outbound Sales Team 220

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 12, 2021

At medium-sized funds, each partner often does 2 investments a year. Even in seed funds, each partner often just does 3–4 investments a year. Freemium is a funnel management strategy and done right, later it can accelerate viral acquisition. But putting up a new, free product on its own will get you zero customers.

Sales Hiring 322

Sales Hiring Investment Acquisition Product Marketing 322

OpenView Labs

FEBRUARY 2, 2021

The report’s authors already laid out how to get back to hyper-growth , and their article inspired me to share my predictions for 2021’s most important product marketing trends: 1. More SaaS companies will adopt product-led growth. And that takes us to the next marketing trend… 2. Growth in 2021 and beyond.

Product Marketing 58

Product Marketing Trends Scale Marketing 58

User Pilot

OCTOBER 5, 2023

TL;DR The CAC payback period measures the time it takes for a company to recover the money invested in new customer acquisition. This metric helps SaaS companies choose the most effective customer acquisition channels , diagnose inefficiencies in customer retention strategies , and inform pricing decisions.

SaaS Payments 104

SaaS Payments Customer Lifetime Value Payment Solutions Acquisition 104

SaaStr

JUNE 17, 2023

In the ever-evolving landscape of SaaS, Venture Capital, Bootstrapping, and Valuations – understanding market trends and investment patterns is critical. We’ll explain Jason’s take on the recent market fluctuations, highlighting major deals that shaped investment patterns and their effects on valuation trends.

Venture Capital 205

Venture Capital Scale Technical Review Software Review 205

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 3, 2019

There’s a little bit of work to do still, but you know, tonight the title of my talk is how to make user acquisition practically free. So to illustrate this, I want to talk about getting deep product/market fit, and specifically one story of a founder that I admire by the name of Parker Conrad that he has told in the past.

Acquisition 137

Acquisition Software Review Payment Methods Marketplace as a Service 137

Chart Mogul

OCTOBER 3, 2019

The customer acquisition cost can help you create, measure, and improve a business model that will put your business on the path to profitability. The design of your product? . Marketing? . What is the Customer Acquisition Cost? CAC stands for customer acquisition cost. Let’s play a little thought experiment.

Acquisition 91

Acquisition Underperforming Technical Team Startup Customer Lifetime Value 91

SaaStr

JANUARY 24, 2024

From an R&D perspective, they invested in what they called vertical solutions to support those new use cases. So, Calendly decided to invest in going Enterprise. Kate has a simple framework for going upmarket: Product, People, and Process. From a product standpoint, you might think you have product market fit.

Scale 217

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Revenue 217

SaaStr

APRIL 25, 2019

Thanks so much everyone for joining us for our fireside chat today, disrupting the desk phone: how and why we made a $50 million acquisition. Jessica Lin : So we’ll chat more about analogy, really milk that, and again, you’ll hear, especially throughout this session why this is not really a story about just one acquisition.

Acquisition 149

Acquisition Technical Review Systems Review AI 149

Casey Accidental

NOVEMBER 28, 2023

After product/market fit, most companies’ obsession is not thinking about how to create their next amazing product. Specifically, how do I get this product I know is valuable in the hands of everyone it can be valuable to. This can be new growth loops for the same product, or entirely new products.

Payments 63

Payments Scale Payment Methods Underperforming Technical Team 63

Tom Tunguz

OCTOBER 7, 2015

During a typical diligence process, we will interview customers and might ask them questions like these: How did you hear about the product? We’re looking to understand what customer acquisition mechanisms are working for the company, and if they are consistent with the company’s perceptions. How much do you pay?

Product Marketing 128

Product Marketing Development Team Review Software Review Startup 128

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 29, 2023

Lattice has launched four product suites in the last eight years, and the ideas that drove their growth apply to most companies today. Many of you are familiar with this visual, most likely created by an investment firm. This showcases a narrow segment of a niche market, and it’s missing a lot of startups.

Scale 222

Scale Scaling Startup Sales Hiring 222

User Pilot

MARCH 29, 2024

Poor product-market fit. Ineffective marketing/poor marketing strategy. Wrong acquisition channels. Complicated product. Upon reviewing your feature pages, many website visitors will realize the product doesn’t align with their expectations. Lack of lead nurturing efforts.

Scale 103

Scale Sales Funnel Onboarding Retention 103

SaaStr

DECEMBER 30, 2022

Not all products are made for enterprise customers. Instead, focus on understanding your target market. . The best way to achieve product-market fit is to study your audience as early as possible and comprehensively overview customer segments in your niche. It’s a waste of time to try to get everyone interested.

Scale 189

Scale Scaling Revenue Enterprise 189

Chart Mogul

OCTOBER 3, 2019

The customer acquisition cost can help you create, measure, and improve a business model that will put your business on the path to profitability. The design of your product? After your product/market fit, your business model is the most important consideration if you’re to save your business from the startup graveyard.

Acquisition 52

Acquisition Startup Underperforming Technical Team Customer Lifetime Value 52

SaaStr

OCTOBER 7, 2022

The number of global venture capital (VC) investments dipped in 2022, thanks to ongoing geopolitical tensions, turbulence in global capital markets, supply chain issues, and increasing interest rates. The rise and fall of these investments have resulted in negativity in the global VC space in 2022. The recent downward movement.

Venture Capital 198

Venture Capital Marketing Startup Construction 198

User Pilot

JUNE 20, 2023

Once you launch the MVP, you can use product usage data and customer feedback to inform further iterations. As you’re getting ready to launch the MVP, make sure to develop a robust go-to-market strategy to drive customer acquisition and revenue generation. Is it the best way to invest the resources?

Underperforming Technical Team 95

Underperforming Technical Team Social Media Scale Interviewing 95

SaaStr

MAY 6, 2021

Just note, you’ll need a strong balance sheet and stable investments — it takes money to make money. Before Skilljar, Kathy Lord worked for 14 years growing Intacct; she’d brought the company from $2M in revenue through to an acquisition at just under $1B. What are the tricky things? Size: a company that was $10-20M in revenue.

Sales Hiring 228

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Interviewing Revenue 228

Andreessen Horowitz

APRIL 23, 2024

So unless there’s some really obvious or transformative thing to do in your business today, it’s worth waiting a little bit to invest heavily in that. We’re experimenting with it, but we haven’t made a massive investment. Alex: The other side of the equation on customer acquisition is monetization.

Payments 105

Payments Forecasting Payment Services Payment Solutions 105

Sales Hacker

MARCH 15, 2022

Join us for an entrepreneurial conversation about how to modernize your talent acquisition approach for both high growth and long-term growth. The importance of listening to the market instead of pursuing growth. 4 ways to modernize talent acquisition. 4 ways to modernize talent acquisition [22:26]. powered by Sounder.

Sales Hiring 93

Sales Hiring Underperforming Technical Team Acquisition Development 93

Casey Accidental

FEBRUARY 26, 2024

In my recent essay about second products , I talked about how the goal of building a second product is not the traditional concept of product/market fit we’ve all been raised on regarding startups. In some ways, our goal with a second product is easier, and in some ways, much harder.

Underperforming Technical Team 63

Underperforming Technical Team Scale GCP(Google Cloud Platform) Startup 63

SaaStr

APRIL 2, 2023

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! Invest in back-office systems early. For this one deal, we just need to do X.

Sales Hiring 255

Sales Hiring Scale Scaling Customer Success 255

User Pilot

JANUARY 18, 2023

With so many product marketing strategies floating around the SaaS world, it can be hard to identify the right one. In this guide, we’re going to go over what PLG marketing is and why it just might be the perfect approach for your business. Userpilot tools for A/B testing.

Strategy 97

Strategy Marketing Scale Software Review 97

Mucker Capital

JANUARY 9, 2024

The analogy of reversing gravity highlights the enduring impact of retention on sustained business growth compared to the short-term impact of acquisition. This not only fortifies the existing customer base, but also informs and enhances acquisition strategies, allowing businesses to attract customers who mirror their premium segment.

Retention 52

Retention B2C Scale Acquisition 52

The Angel VC

MAY 8, 2015

In my post I suggested that you should prepare a key metrics spreadsheet, a chart with your MRR movements, a cohort analysis, a financial plan, an analysis of your customer acquisition channels and, if you're selling to bigger customers, information about your sales pipeline and details about your largest customers. Organic, paid, both?

Development Team Review 252

Development Team Review Software Review Scale Acquisition 252

User Pilot

MAY 8, 2023

Most challenges that a software company will face fall into one of three categories: product, sales, and business/operations. Getting the positioning, messaging , and product-market fit right will be one of the earliest determiners of whether or not a SaaS solution will find success within its target market.

Software Review 98

Software Review Outsourcing Services SaaS Sales Hiring 98

User Pilot

JULY 27, 2023

Product Marketing Manager: This person is tasked with developing product marketing campaigns , crafting compelling marketing messages, and coming up with ideas to retain customers. A positive NPV indicates that the project is expected to generate more financial value than the initial investment.

Sales Hiring 98

Sales Hiring SaaS Payments Sales Recruiting CTO Hire 98

Tom Tunguz

DECEMBER 15, 2019

Setting the Salesforce/Tableau Acquisition in Context - A wave of consolidation swept the BI industry. This article talked about the sizes of these acquisition relative to history. We've invested in more than 15 open source companies over the last 15 years (eg, Hashicorp, Cockroach Labs, Dremio…).

Scale 115

Scale Innovation Acquisition Churn 115

The Angel VC

NOVEMBER 29, 2013

At the bottom I noted what these phases usually mean in terms of the stage of your product and company and which funding level it typically corresponds with. In order to succeed you need happy customers who do free marketing for you, otherwise customer acquisition will always be an uphill battle. Check it out! ].

Scale 190

Scale Startup SaaS Customer Lifetime Value 190

SaaStr

JUNE 24, 2020

I’ve been investing just long enough now to see start-ups fall out of product-market fit. But I didn’t get that apps with happy customers, and some real traction, could fall out of product-market fit. One reason is low NPS and a poor product. You fall out of product-market fit.

Product Marketing 363

Product Marketing Sales Hiring Marketing Startup 363

User Pilot

JULY 4, 2023

Use popular platforms like Product Hunt to launch your product to get new users. Implement a product-led growth strategy to allow early adopters a chance to test your product without making an investment. Continue to collect customer feedback to make small iterations on a handful of users to perfect your product.

Scale 93

Scale Scaling Technical Review SaaS 93