SaaStr

OCTOBER 23, 2022

SaaStr 600: Founder Confidential with HubSpot Founder and CTO Dharmesh Shah, & Founder and Executive Chairperson Brian Halligan. ?. SaaStr 599: Growth vs. Efficiency: How to Weatherproof Your SaaS Startup for Tougher Times with Point Nine Founder and Partner Christoph Janz. ? ?. The Average SaaS CEO is 43 at IPO (Updated).

CTO 173

CTO Scale Business Model Retention 173

SaaStr

MAY 27, 2024

There is more capital available to startups than ever before. The influx of capital has made it easier for startups to raise money, but it has also led to higher valuations and more competition. His best deals by cash are: Sales Loft : $2.5 He also learned that some founders just can’t lose, like Kyle from Sales Loft.

CTO Hire 176

CTO Hire Development Team Review Software Review Technical Review 176

SaaStr

OCTOBER 8, 2020

We caught up with one of the SaaStr community’s favorite speakers, Dharmesh Shah CTO and co-founder of Hubspot on lessons learnings launching a second product. Hubspot recently expanded its Sales products and the learnings were top of mind. 2) Often, startups are a victim of their own success. Or even, nothing.

New CTO 235

New CTO CTO Scale B2C 235

SaaStr

JUNE 25, 2023

What are some qualities of a bad startup CEO/founder in Silicon Valley? Sometimes, a non-technical CEO is so great at sales and the vision that sheer force of will allows them to sell several million of a product that just isn’t there, or isn’t very good. The post Dear SaaStr: What Are Some of the Qualities of a “Bad” Startup CEO?

Startup 191

Startup New CTO CTO Investment 191

TechEmpower SaaS

DECEMBER 11, 2023

Although noteworthy, working with large corporations differs remarkably from working with startups. cto , product , saas Are they publicly available? Beware of being swayed by big-name firms or impressive name-dropping. Understand exactly what the company contributed to each project. Or do you need help evaluating software firms?

Software Development 443

Software Development Development Software Review Software 443

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 3, 2022

Dear SaaStr: What Are The Top Things to Know Before Starting a SaaS Startup? A mediocre “coder” CTO because you can’t code … won’t really work out. A mediocre “business guy” that can’t really marketing and sales won’t really get you those key early customers. Top of my list: Picking a mediocre co-founder just doesn’t work.

Venture Capital 250

Venture Capital Startup CTO SaaS 250

SaaStr

DECEMBER 16, 2023

You really need a great CTO, not just a good business team. A mediocre tech team, a part-time CTO, or even just a decent CTO just doesn’t get you there. If you can’t do the time, don’t do the startup. You’ll probably hire the wrong first VP of Sales. It’s just too competitive today.

Part-Time VPE 207

Part-Time VPE CTO Hire Sales Recruiting VPCs (Virtual Private Cloud) 207

SaaStr

OCTOBER 25, 2023

For part one of this Ask Me Anything session, Jason covers everything you need to know about hiring your first VP of Sales, what he really thinks about AI, what the future of lead generation in 2024 looks like, and much more. Lead generation tools do change, but the basic motions of sales and marketing haven’t changed much.

Scale 230

Scale Sales Hiring AI Sales Recruiting 230

SaaStr

AUGUST 9, 2022

Investments I've made that didn't work out: – Momentum investment – CEO a bit of bulls**t artist – CEO good at sales but weak product team / CTO. Some sales-y, some very technical. CEO good at sales, but CTO not that great. So now I try to only invest in Great CEO + Great CTO combos.

Investment 253

Investment Sales Recruiting CTO Startup 253

SaaStr

OCTOBER 30, 2022

The Simple Reason Startups That Just Raised $100s of Millions Are Doing Layoffs. SaaStr 602: Secrets To Combining PLG and Enterprise Sales with Grammarly CEO Brad Hoover. ?. SaaStr 603: SaaStr CRO Confidential Presents the Ultimate Guide to Sales Compensation, Quotas and Recruiting with SaaStr CEO and Founder, Jason Lemkin.

Sales Recruiting 266

Sales Recruiting CTO Compensation Software Review 266

SaaStr

JUNE 11, 2023

Check out this week’s top blog posts, podcasts, and videos: Top Blog Posts This Week: Only 18% of Your Sales Teams Are Really Hitting Plan Right Now Growth Slowed Down About 33% On Average For Everyone in Q1 Beware the “Mediocre Recycled” The Zombie Executives of SaaS. Especially … Today?

CTO Coach 177

CTO Coach CTO Scale Scaling 177

SaaStr

JULY 13, 2023

Startups come in all shapes and sizes on various stages of a timeline, yet it’s not surprising how many have the same questions and concerns about how to scale from x to y to z, the right time to hire and fire, and how to keep a team motivated during hard times. Q: Where Should SDRs Report — Marketing or Sales?

CTO Hire 174

CTO Hire Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale 174

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 24, 2021

Michael Seibel, YC Partner and CEO of YC’s Startup Accelerator @ Y Combinator. Jeffrey Yoshimura, CMO and Customer Experience Officer @ Snyk. Amy Appleyard, VP Sales @ VMWare. Michelle Benfer, VP, Head of North America Sales @ HubSpot. Christine Spang, Co-Founder and CTO @ Nylas. Dave Walters, CTO @ Hired.

VP of Engineering 265

VP of Engineering Technical Cofounder CTO Coach CTO Hire 265

SaaStr

JANUARY 5, 2021

It’s been a fun experience being on Quora for … a decade We’ve crossed 60,000,000 views of our answers there, so let’s take a look at the Top 50 most viewed SaaStr Answers on Quora in 2020: Why do many startup owners sell their firm and move on instead of planning on making it a big player like Google, Microsoft, etc.?

Software Review 276

Software Review CTO Coach Technical Review Sales Recruiting 276

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 16, 2021

David’s first foray into SaaS was in 1999 when he joined a startup that would become PayPal, starting as the product leader and later as the COO. In 2008, he founded Yammer, an enterprise software company that David grew to 500 employees and $60 million in sales. Head of Sales. CTO (40 Employees). VP Sales (45 Employees).

CTO Hire 234

CTO Hire Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting CTO 234

The SaaS Garage

DECEMBER 15, 2022

repath , an emerging Impact startup founded in Hamburg in 2021, raises €1.2 “It’s important and that we are in line with the current state of the art in science and that we see ourselves as a research-based impact startup.” The post Impact startup repath raises 1.2 repath raises 1.2

CTO 52

CTO Startup Venture Capital Transportation 52

SaaStr

AUGUST 7, 2021

Devon Rutherford, Managed Services Program Manager & Pre-Sales Manager @ Leaseweb. Michael Seibel, YC Partner and CEO of YC’s Startup Accelerator @ Y Combinator. Amy Appleyard, VP Sales @ VMWare. Michelle Benfer, VP, Head of North America Sales @ HubSpot. Christine Spang, Co-Founder and CTO @ Nylas.

VP of Engineering 261

VP of Engineering Technical Cofounder CTO Coach CTO Hire 261

SaaStr

JULY 30, 2022

We need the money to get sales and marketing going.” Our CTO is leaving.” You need to make sure your startup is at least structurally attractive to the VC fund you talk to. Our sales are flat but we’ll make it up later in the year.” While logical, again, this isn’t what VCs want to hear. Not jump start it. Disclose it.

CTO 275

CTO Engineering Startup Revenue 275

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 6, 2024

It likely will in fact create conflict if you add a separate sales team to sell adding fries to the order. You really need a separate sales team almost on Day 1 here. Maybe it can start off as founder-led sales, but you need a totally distinct team. They get a few sales, but nothing like what they expected.

Scale 206

Scale New CTO CTO Scaling 206

SaaStr

JUNE 28, 2022

All startups have issues and challenges, and all deals have some “hair” on them. While startups have ups and downs, if you tell the VCs you’re going to hit $250,000 in revenue this month … make 100 percent sure you hit that projection. This is surprisingly common in startups with more than two or three founders. Who is the CEO?

Finance 271

Finance Technical Review CTO Hire New CTO 271

SaaStr

MARCH 26, 2024

AI is coming for sales and marketing, and Jason is a super fan of AI in marketing. Because hundreds of the best founders are radically ripping through post-sales AI, and now it’s time for marketing. It’s challenging to find super high-quality folks unless you’re in B2C, where customer support is sales. It’s too early.”

AI 223

AI Pricing Artificial Intelligence Scale 223

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 7, 2023

with Aashish Krishna Kumar, Head of GTM at Togai Sales Enablement 2.0 – Elevate Rep Performance with Divanshu Goyal, Sales at GTM Buddy Common scaling pains for SaaS businesses and how to overcome them. Straight from a SaaS CCO with Yellow.ai’s CCO with Shekar Murthy, Chief Customer Officer at Yellow.ai

VP of Engineering 228

VP of Engineering Technical Cofounder Outsourcing Services CTO Coach 228

SaaStr

JULY 3, 2022

The Ultimate Guide for Hiring a Great VP of Sales. Dear SaaStr: How Many Sales Reps Do I Need? SaaStr 567: Classic Episode: eCommerce API Startup to Unicorn With Shippo Co-Founder and CEO Laura Behrens Wu. with Jenn Knight, Co-founder and CTO of AgentSync, and Daryna Kulya, Co-founder of OpenPhone.

CTO Hire 187

CTO Hire Sales Hiring CTO Scale 187

Baremetrics

DECEMBER 7, 2023

Here’s an overview of the series: Part 1: How to Categorize Expenses in a SaaS Startup v2.0 Even without any breakdowns, obviously the CEO was fully aware of the company’s increased spending in sales and marketing. Even without any breakdowns, obviously the CEO was fully aware of the company’s increased spending in sales and marketing.

Merchant Services 90

Merchant Services Startup DevOps as a Service SaaS 90

SaaStr

JULY 28, 2021

One of the most popular sessions at SaaStr Annual, Busting the Myths About Startup Success with BlackLine CEO and Founder Therese Tucker is up at the top of our must-watch list. I retired from SunGard Treasury Systems as their CTO. Don’t be that guy with your startup. The reality is most startups fail.

Startup 266

Startup CTO Hire Sales Hiring CTO Coach 266

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 18, 2020

Wondering how your SaaS business got slapped with a multi-million dollar sales tax bill from one or multiple states? Probably because you, like so many other SaaS companies out there, didn’t even know you had to collect and remit sales tax. Sales tax laws across the United States are pretty inconsistent, especially for SaaS solutions.

New CTO 157

New CTO SaaS Sales CTO 157

SaaStr

JULY 25, 2023

HubSpot Inbound: While not exclusively focused on SaaS, HubSpot Inbound brings together marketers, sales professionals, and customer success teams to explore the latest inbound marketing and customer engagement trends, which are crucial for SaaS companies’ success. According to ChatGPT. appeared first on SaaStr.

ChatGPT 215

ChatGPT AWS SaaS CTO 215

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 18, 2020

Here are our most popular answers over the past 12 months: How do VCs value startups? Which startup did you leave too early? (74k What makes a bad CTO? Are there any examples of a unicorn startup that was bootstrapped? I’m tired of running my (very) successful (VC funded) startup after 5+ years. 90k views).

Venture Capital 215

Venture Capital New CTO CTO Startup 215

SaaStr

AUGUST 18, 2019

Even if you don’t like sales, or big companies, or whatever. Not hiring a good enough CTO. If you never thought you’d sell to sales reps, and even sort of hate sales, but that’s your core customer — embrace it. A bit more here: 15+ of The Top Sales & Marketing Mistakes SaaS Startups Make | SaaStr.

Growth Hacking 114

Growth Hacking CTO Hire Startup Sales Hiring 114

SaaStr

DECEMBER 20, 2023

So to serve both segments at the simultaneously, ZoomInfo has been rolling out a Product-led sales motion, that gives the ability for an SMB customer to sign up directly on their website for a free trial and grow into a paid customer, without ever having to talk to an sales rep or go through a demo process. So, what’s new at ZoomInfo?

New CTO 237

New CTO Scale Sales Hiring AWS 237

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 17, 2020

The founders named their startup JFrog because a frog is agile and always leaping forward. Yet the strategy was not to have a conventional startup. There was also a highly efficient inbound sales model. In fact, there is currently no field sales organization! And yes, the company has been doing this from the start.

New CTO 198

New CTO CTO Benchmarks Consulting 198

SaaStr

APRIL 7, 2021

They often staff up their teams with folks they already know and have been successful with at their last startup. Often folks they convince to once again be a VP of Eng or VP of Sales. The sales leader that did well, but their startup still didn’t quite make it. Veterans of the SaaS journey. And that’s great.

Part-Time VPE 231

Part-Time VPE Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting CTO Hire 231

SaaStr

MAY 2, 2021

“The 5 things that kill startups after their seed rounds with Michael Seibel, CEO of Y Combinator” A SaaStr classic from the last SaaStr Annual. #4. “Recruiting Your Sales Team with Brex Chief Sales Officer Sam Blond” Brex was just valued at $7B just 4 years after founding.

Sales Recruiting 140

Sales Recruiting Scale CTO Scaling 140

User Pilot

MARCH 7, 2024

So I talked to several female leaders in SaaS – about their experience with breaking into leadership positions in tech startups – what challenges they’ve faced, and how they managed to overcome them. Melissa Kwan : “I quit my job in SAP and wanted to start a company that uses technology. Sima Banijamali – Sr.

Technical Review 102

Technical Review CTO Coach Sales Hiring CTO Hire 102

SaaStr

JANUARY 12, 2022

Indeed this was also my #1 mistake and the #1 I see from so many startups learning to go upmarket. We all know this, but we forget about it, especially when the Hot New Deal and the sales team’s wants and needs consumes all of management’s resources. We all underresource customer success vs. sales. Are we sure?

CTO Hire 264

CTO Hire Sales Hiring New CTO CTO 264

SaaStr

AUGUST 25, 2023

To some extent, if you have the hottest startup in the world, the full package, you can play some games with investors. 99% of startups aren’t that. For 99% of startups, when you want money, tell VCs you want money. 2 “Give the VP of Sales more time.” But you have to see progress in one sales cycle.

Part-Time VPE 175

Part-Time VPE Scale Sales Hiring CTO Hire 175

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 11, 2022

They were aware of it, but startups that I work with closely or invested in, if they got all the way to 25 million with 75% NRR, I would tell them to quit today. They have service and all this, but the second cloud for them was sales. Your core models for sales, for marketing spend, for hiring and engineering and product.

Outsourcing Services 180

Outsourcing Services Banking CTO Hire New CTO 180