SaaStr

JUNE 8, 2025

Dear SaaStr: I Fired My VP of Sales. Here’s what you should do next: Step in as Interim VP of Sales (If Needed) If you don’t have someone ready to step up, you’ll need to take the reins yourself temporarily. You know the product, the customers, and the sales process better than anyone else. What you do need to do is have a plan.

Sales Hiring 175

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Sales Interviewing 175

SaaStr

JULY 4, 2025

A plumbing company isn’t hiring a Chief AI Officer. At Least Right Now. Every dollar going to “AI transformation” is a dollar not going to traditional SaaS tools. Non-tech industries? They’re not there yet. A construction firm isn’t building an AI lab. Zoom is no longer growing.

Merchant Services 323

Merchant Services SaaS Payments Payment Services Payments 323

SaaStr

MARCH 4, 2021

But, I know many of you have never hired a head of marketing before. And if you hire the wrong type — the more common type — then instead of more customers, you may end up with just a bunch of Blue Pens with your logo on them. Making sure you sit in the right place in the market, and are communicating that to the market.

Sales Hiring 357

Sales Hiring Scale Marketing Branding 357

SaaStr

JULY 2, 2025

The Hiring Philosophy That Built a $23B Company “Every single person you hire should be your best hire ever. Unless you leave an interview very excited—like ‘I wish this person was here right now’—don’t hire them.” ” Raaz is obsessed with hiring. She already knew cyber.

Sales Hiring 175

Sales Hiring Marketing AI Cybersecurity 175

SaaStr

JULY 11, 2024

How Do You Sift Out the Bitter and Broken Individuals When Hiring? If it’s a role you’ve never hired, find someone great at it and have them do your final interview. For sales, product, or customer success, the best question you could ask is, “What would you do your first couple of weeks?” Don’t hire those people to lead.

Sales Hiring 285

Sales Hiring Scale Marketing Interviewing 285

SaaStr

APRIL 20, 2025

Dear SaaStr: How Should I Actually Set the Sales Plan for the Year For My VP Sales? C60 (Base Plan) : This is your core plan and the one you communicate to your team. This is where you build your operational model: sales hiring, marketing spend, product investments, etc. Try the C10, C60, and C90 framework.

Sales Hiring 162

Sales Hiring Sales Communication Revenue 162

SaaStr

MARCH 5, 2025

In our most recent episode of CRO Confidential , hosted by Sam Blond , Graham Moreno , VP of Worldwide Sales at Codium, shared invaluable insights on what drove this growth, the challenges they faced, and how other SaaS companies can replicate this success. Their strategy?

Sales Hiring 185

Sales Hiring Scale Sales Recruiting AI 185

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 2, 2023

Product marketing can be difficult, and managing product launches and rollouts can be complex. Your sales rise to a very high level You may realize that your sales are reaching high levels, but at the same time, you may encounter a situation where there needs to be more structure or control in your sales process.

Sales Hiring 260

Sales Hiring Product Marketing Scale Marketing 260

SaaStr

MARCH 18, 2025

As Colin describes it, “I went to the CEO and asked to generate more revenue and hire more people, which is counter-intuitive to the standard approach where revenue leaders may sandbag to over deliver and crush numbers.”

Scale 185

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Sales Recruiting 185

SaaStr

JANUARY 21, 2020

Justin Welsh, former SVP of Sales at PatientPop explains how he started in SaaS in 2009 as the second sales hire at Zocdoc. Justin used Sales Culture to grow a successful PatientPop team to 140 employees and 55 million in revenue. Justin Welsh | SVP Sales @ PatientPop. Want to see more content like this?

Sales Recruiting 332

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Sales 332

SaaStr

DECEMBER 16, 2022

Sam Blond, Partner at Founders Fund, joined Matt Plank, VP of Sales at Rippling, to unlock the secrets to exponential revenue growth. In their outbound efforts, when Rippling team members emailed CEOs and founders of tech companies, they communicated how their offering wasn’t just another HR solution. Scaling your go-to-market efforts.

Outsourcing Services 282

Outsourcing Services Scale Sales Hiring Outsourced Development 282

TechEmpower SaaS

DECEMBER 11, 2023

While the appearance matters, remember you are hiring the development firm primarily for its development skills, not its graphic design skills. Communication: Evaluate their communication style. Is there a project manager? An account manager? Will you have direct access to a lead developer?

Software Development 443

Software Development Development Software Review Software 443

SaaStr

JANUARY 31, 2022

Having learned from thousands of customers and prospects, Sarah Lash, Envoy’s head of enterprise sales, will talk about what it takes to guide and scale enterprise sales programs during an uncertain future. In my first six months at Envoy , I grew the sales team from six to 17. Combine Strategies To Drive Sales.

Sales Recruiting 246

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Enterprise 246

SaaStr

AUGUST 15, 2024

Robbie O’Connor, the GM EMEA at Notion and the first European hire at Asana and Dropbox takes the stage at SaaStr Europa to talk about the building blocks required to scale GTM teams and operations. Unlike product-led or sales-led growth, Notion is focused on community-led growth. You can get this wrong.

Scale 310

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Innovation 310

SaaStr

JULY 8, 2024

How much more could you accomplish with your sales organization? Justworks CRO, Robert Lopez, and Director of Sales, Valeria Avila, show you how to create longevity in your sales organization and why it matters. If you’re hiring great people and giving them the tools to succeed, get out of their way. They’ll step up.

Sales Hiring 287

Sales Hiring Scale Sales Education 287

SaaStr

OCTOBER 10, 2023

On a sales front, how do you evolve past founder-led sales, or together with it, so that you can scale your organization? Founder-led sales can be an immense strength and rapidly become a limiting factor. PST, Laura Connell, Partner at Atomico, shares how to scale beyond founder-led sales on your path to Series B.

Scale 277

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Sales 277

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 20, 2024

Be disciplined about prioritizing that feedback and communication. Other Learnings in the GTM Journey GitHub has had to adjust to new sales stages and new buyer personas. There was a proliferation of conversations centered around legal, privacy, and models that took much longer in these sales stages than ever experienced.

Scale 261

Scale AI Scaling Marketing 261

SaaStr

JULY 13, 2023

A strong sales leader is vital to any company hoping to scale. With this in mind, hiring for the Head of Sales role is one of the most important things a business can do. Unfortunately, too many companies focus on the wrong things when hiring their sales leaders, which can lead to hires that aren’t the best fit for the business.

Sales Recruiting 244

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Sales 244

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 21, 2020

We’ve written a lot on SaaStr on how to increase the odds your first management team is a success. How to hire a great VP of Sales (tons on that here ). What a great VP of sales really does. When to hire her (more here ). How to manage customer success. How to hire a great VP of product.

Sales Hiring 357

Sales Hiring Scale Sales Recruiting Engineering 357

SaaStr

MARCH 24, 2021

If you want to hire your first sales rep and close more deals, you need to understand how the sales process works, what tools your team needs to be successful and learn to speak sales. Sales definitions you should know. CRM objects — Represent the sales relationship you have with a specific person or company.

Sales Hiring 318

Sales Hiring Startup Sales Outsourced Development 318

SaaStr

APRIL 20, 2022

This famous quote from self-help author Robert Collier applies to every sales organization because excellent results come through repeatable activities, not one-off wins. Alice Katwan , SVP at Twilio , discusses how you can build a high-retention sales team while being remote. Implement systems to attract great talent.

Sales Hiring 272

Sales Hiring Scale Retention Sales 272

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. Don’t make the hire. They weren’t getting any leads.

Sales Hiring 306

Sales Hiring Scale AI Search AI 306

SaaStr

AUGUST 2, 2024

Canva Head of Sales and Success for EMEA, Jorge Bestard, and Head of Strategic Sales for EMEA, Daniela Nyarko, share Canva’s journey from PLG to Enterprise, strategies to navigate the PLG trap, and why it’s so attractive. You get traction in the market and raise a round to build a marketing and sales team.

Scale 283

Scale Sales Hiring Sales B2C 283

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 28, 2024

Kyle Norton CRO of Owner is kicking off a new podcast for Pavillion with revenue leaders, and we were lucky enough to be guest #001 here: It’s a great convo on many SaaStr themes — but from the perspective of a VP Sales / CRO. If you’re going to miss your quarter, communicate this early and come prepared with a plan to address it.

Technical Review 298

Technical Review Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Revenue 298

SaaStr

APRIL 30, 2024

How do you build GTM efficiency in SMB sales? Lesson #1: Just Say No Once he joined, Kyle quickly discovered that Owner had a leaky bucket and had either bad or no targeting on prospects, was closing a lot of poor-fit customers, and there were a lot of miss set expectations from sales so customer handoff was sketchy at best.

Scale 301

Scale SMB Sales Hiring Sales 301

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 30, 2022

“The hardest part of closing any deal is finding it,” says Lars Nilsson, VP of Global Sales Development at Snowflake. Over his 35+ year career, Nilsson has managed 100+ Sales Development Representatives (SDR) across four continents, six countries, and ten cities. Jumpstart pipeline generation with your first five revenue hires.

Sales Hiring 246

Sales Hiring Development Technical Review Management 246

SaaStr

JANUARY 12, 2024

We just wrote up how some of the biggest changes of SaaS are now coming, specifically in Customer Success and Sales. ” Prediction #3: CSM Hiring Doesn’t Bounce All The Way Back Things are bouncing back, in 2024, not all the way back, so efficiency still matters. They paused hiring for a year (rather than cut) and got profitable.

Sales Hiring 320

Sales Hiring Customer Success Scale AI 320

SaaStr

OCTOBER 10, 2022

From a venture capital perspective, there’s now a premium on driving efficient growth rather than growth at any cost. . “Sales and marketing alignment is a terrific place to figure out and improve efficient growth.” . From the get-go, ensure alignment between sales and marketing teams on goals and anticipated outcomes.

Scale 325

Scale Sales Hiring Venture Capital Marketing 325

SaaStr

APRIL 20, 2024

Marketing hackers, sales hackers, product hackers. Will AI let ICs do more, with fewer managers? AI in Sales and Marketing AI is disrupting sales and marketing, particularly in support and SDR /BDR functions, due to the shortage of skilled workers and the potential for increased efficiency and cost savings.

Sales Hiring 301

Sales Hiring Startup Marketing Technical Review 301

SaaStr

JULY 1, 2024

It’s less jack-of-all-trade hires, so the knowledge and questions they’ll ask will look a lot different. Either way, ensure the demand gen team sits down with sales and decides which accounts to go after. Either way, ensure the demand gen team sits down with sales and decides which accounts to go after.

Sales Hiring 300

Sales Hiring Scale SMB compliance 300

SaaStr

OCTOBER 30, 2021

I asked Aasif Osmany to share his learnings as a top-performing SMB VP of Sales, below. Together we combed through AngelList and found companies that we saw potential in, however, most were not hiring. While at Gorgias, I expected to leave with as much knowledge to earn me an honorary bachelor’s in sales.

Scale 284

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Underperforming Technical Team 284

Sales Hacker

OCTOBER 15, 2024

With almost two decades of broad technology experience, he has anchored GTM teams in SaaS & Service industries including consulting, network & communications, software, e-commerce, and supply chain. Cliff is a recipient of the 2024 Modern Sales Leader award from HubSpot and a 2024Top 50 CRO to Watch by Pavilion.

Acquisition 111

Acquisition Sales Hiring ChatGPT AI 111

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 8, 2022

Scaling a sales organization isn’t easy. Knowing which metrics matter and how to analyze them to increase your revenue and hit organizational sales goals is essential. . What makes a sales organization grow? What’s the best way to grow a sales organization? Enter your email below for the latest SaaStr updates.

Scale 292

Scale Sales Hiring Compensation Sales 292

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 3, 2021

Ashley Grech, the Global Head of Sales for Square, shares advice and tips based on learnings from Square’s incredible success in moving upmarket and expanding their customer base from micro-merchants to large enterprises. . Your product team and frontline teams should communicate on a continuing basis. Build the Right Feedback Loops.

Scale 274

Scale Sales Hiring Merchant Services Sales 274

SaaStr

JUNE 27, 2024

As it grows, it changes significantly, especially as you move from hiring people who can do everything to hiring more specialized roles. What is the CEO’s role in hiring during different stages? What is the CEO’s role in hiring during different stages? Your culture can’t be ephemeral, where only the CEO knows.

Scale 261

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Sales Recruiting 261

SaaStr

MARCH 20, 2024

They discuss Sam’s learnings at Founders Fund, what the 2024 playbook looks like, hiring and motivating sales teams, and a handful of audience questions. On the sales side, people hired way too much. More salespeople do not equal more sales. If that’s true, then you should absolutely hire more salespeople.

Sales Hiring 300

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Headcount 300

SaaStr

DECEMBER 29, 2022

Go Hire That Missing VP! The best way to get out of a hole is to hire a great VP. A great VP of Sales. Well, stop saying you can’t hire anyone. And just go finally hire her. #2. Everyone lowered the hiring bar a bit in the 2021 Boom. Do a better job communicating with your investors. Of Product.

Sales Hiring 292

Sales Hiring Venture Capital Healthcare Communication 292