SaaStr

NOVEMBER 27, 2021

Is your CS team growing as fast as your sales team? If this is your first SaaS company, you may not have ever hired or built a Customer Success team. This one isn’t nearly as risky as a VP of Sales , or a VP of Marketing hire. You’ll make a good hire. So hire your first as soon as you can. >>

Sales Hiring 246

Sales Hiring Customer Success Scale Customer Lifetime Value 246

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 27, 2021

Is your CS team growing as fast as your sales team? If this is your first SaaS company, you may not have ever hired or built a Customer Success team. This one isn’t nearly as risky as a VP of Sales , or a VP of Marketing hire. You’ll make a good hire. So hire your first as soon as you can. >>

Sales Hiring 196

Sales Hiring Customer Success Scale Customer Lifetime Value 196

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 267

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Headcount 267

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 18, 2022

Sales-driven SaaS startups end up with about half their headcount in sales and marketing. Sales doesn't. 2x the sales headcount you thought you did to hit the full plan for this year, and Q1 of next year. And finally, it dawns on your there is no leverage in sales. Or you’ll get behind.

Scale 341

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Headcount 341

Sales Hacker

MAY 15, 2023

It’s hard to know when you’re ready to hire a sales team — and the consequences can make or break your startup. And that may include owning and executing the sales process , from initial outreach and lead generation to closing deals — not hiring a sales team right away.

Sales Hiring 86

Sales Hiring Scale Outsourcing Services Payment Services 86

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 25, 2020

We’ve talked a lot on SaaStr about how to hire a Great VP of Sales. And we’ll keep talking about it — so long as 70% of first-time VPs of Sales don’t make it 1 year. Reason #1 is jumping to Stretch VP of Sales one stage too early. Not hiring people better than you. Do not do this.

Sales Hiring 350

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Sales Headcount 350

SaaStr

JANUARY 30, 2023

They focused on building a payment platform that empowers international talent and independent contractors to get paid on time in a compliant way while also ensuring that companies can hire international talent and make payments efficiently. From paid ads to account executive productivity, inform any decision you can with data.

Sales Hiring 237

Sales Hiring Payment Services SaaS Payments Scale 237

SaaStr

MARCH 8, 2023

When the company started 20 years ago, it didn’t hire salespeople. So what should earlier-stage companies do: immediately build out a big sales team or focus on product-led growth? It wasn’t until 12 years in that they hired their first commission rep. Now they have sales reps, but still consider themselves PLG.

Sales Hiring 225

Sales Hiring Enterprise Headcount Scale 225

SaaStr

MAY 12, 2021

And you have to hire ahead (of course). Second, calculate a reasonable attainable quota for your closers, your Account Executives. Your VPs and Directors of Sales and sales ops leaders are cost centers here. Assume 1 sales manager for each 8 sales professionals. 2 Managers. = 2 Managers. =

Scale 313

Scale Sales Hiring Headcount Sales 313

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 256

Sales Hiring Customer Success Scale AI 256

SaaStr

MAY 7, 2024

Sales Qualification You’re entered into a flow when you sign up and enter an email on Runway’s website to join their waiting list. Then, they draft a customized email for that person and put the draft inside the draft folder of a sales rep. Everything below “Runway Sales Copilot” is written by AI. Automate before hiring.

AI 203

AI Engineering Sales Hiring ChatGPT 203

SaaStr

JUNE 16, 2023

Dear SaaStr: How Many Sales Reps Do I Need? You can back into how many sales reps you’ll need in SaaS. Second, calculate a reasonable attainable quota for your closers, your Account Executives. That may actually be high, especially if you are scaling quickly and make a few hiring errors. Because that’s more than now.

Scale 261

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Headcount 261

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 19, 2023

Some of the changes we’ve seen in the last year or two include: CAC reduction Headcount optimization Price complexity Quality of revenue A different environment means a different strategy, and Notion Capital lays out four business model changes that could be helpful based on what peers are doing. You don’t want to be there.

Business Model 260

Business Model SaaS Payments Payments Headcount 260

SaaStr

OCTOBER 18, 2019

I still see most startups way behind on their 2020 planning, and most importantly, hiring, at this point in the year. With precise headcount and budget needs. Second, you have to try to hire as many of the sales reps you’ll need for the end of Q1 … by mid-Q4. How many reps. How many SDRs. More on that here. This is key.

Sales Hiring 187

Sales Hiring Scale Headcount Revenue 187

Sales Hacker

APRIL 5, 2021

In 2020 I was building my sales team at Livestorm , and at the time we were going through a big hiring boom. For the first time in my life, I was in charge of vetting and hiring new team members at scale. This was a big challenge for me because I am very passionate about hiring without bias. First impressions still count.

Sales Hiring 92

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Company Culture Interviewing 92

Sales Hacker

SEPTEMBER 30, 2020

Companies were growing their sales organizations and bringing in more revenue. The biggest obstacle to hiring was that there simply weren’t too many great candidates on the job market. Companies everywhere have frozen their hiring and laid off workers — with sales reps often among the first to go.

Sales Hiring 94

Sales Hiring Scale Sales Recruiting Sales 94

SaaStr

MAY 24, 2023

Monday has held the line on hiring and costs, but kept up strong growth — the combination of which “flipped the switch” into a radically more efficient model. At least in the short term, it is turning most of us can do more with about the same headcount in SaaS. #4. Headcount Growing, But Slowly.

Headcount 297

Headcount Sales Hiring Scale Cloud 297

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 13, 2023

Same Sales Commissions for Upsells as Net New Deals Always interesting to see what folks do here. #8. Adding Back Sales Capacity Now. I.e., Hiring More Reps. Salesforce also just announced its accelerating hiring again. Keeping headcount flat got everyone to be more efficient.

Sales Hiring 250

Sales Hiring Scale Headcount Engineering 250

SaaStr

JUNE 27, 2022

Dear SaaStr: How Many Sales Reps Do I Need? You can back into how many sales reps you’ll need in SaaS. Second, calculate a reasonable attainable quota for your closers, your Account Executives. That may actually be high, especially if you are scaling quickly and make a few hiring errors. 2 Managers. 2 Managers.

Scale 220

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Headcount 220

Sales Hacker

NOVEMBER 17, 2023

Three overarching learnings from incredible sales leaders who have lived through the ups and downs of growing sales teams at some of the fastest growing SaaS companies is exactly what we’ll dive into today – so you can get the learnings and insight without being in the driver’s seat. This week’s newsletter is sponsored by Flex.

Sales Hiring 105

Sales Hiring Scale Headcount Sales 105

SaaStr

MARCH 5, 2021

Flock Safety’s Founder and CEO, Garrett Langley, and its VP of Growth, Alex Latraverse, know a bit about sales. Enough to go from 0 to 100 sales reps in about 18 months — and they’re looking to be well beyond 100 by the end of this month. The three things that led to ramping up sales at Flock Safety were: Achieving product-market fit.

Sales Recruiting 184

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Sales 184

SaaStr

JANUARY 4, 2023

A nice sweet spot for a mix of inside and outside sales. #3. Slowing headcount growth — like lots of others. Okta headcount grew 32% year-over-year, fairly consistent with revenue growth, but then Okta like others slowed down hiring. And that’s up from 118% at IPO. #2. It only grew 4.5% Wow what a story!

Scale 294

Scale Headcount Sales Hiring SMB 294

OpenView Labs

FEBRUARY 10, 2020

From its bootstrapped founding in 2002 all the way to a $5 billion valuation in 2016, Atlassian famously had no sales people. ‘No No sales’ became nearly as synonymous with Atlassian as ‘no software’ was with Salesforce. Atlassian now has a sales team. Public PLG Businesses Are Doubling Down on Sales.

Sales Hiring 57

Sales Hiring Scale Headcount Sales 57

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 3, 2023

By freezing headcount for a year. Mathematically, if you keep the headcount flat and continue growing 50% like Monday or 30% at $2B like Hubspot, you get wildly more efficient. Companies are waiting too long to hire a CFO or VP of Finance. Don’t wait too long to hire a VP of Finance. How did they do that?

Sales Hiring 237

Sales Hiring Headcount Finance Technical Review 237

SaaStr

AUGUST 31, 2021

In the run-up to the 2021 SaaStr Annual , SaaStr’s very own Poya Osgouei sits down with Bryan Elsesser, VP of Sales at SaaStr. Bryan shares tips and his perspective on what’s been effective and useful during his first few months as the VP of Sales at SaaStr. “I should have hired faster.

Sales Hiring 253

Sales Hiring Headcount Sales Branding 253

SaaStr

OCTOBER 17, 2023

The framework above is a lean canvas to help you understand your customers’ needs post-sale. Chances are: You’ve hired your first Head of Sales, and you’re probably about to see a lot of growth on the sales side. Headcount maybe goes from 2 or 4 to 10. What is the highest form of product market fit?

Scale 176

Scale Sales Hiring Customer Success Scaling 176

Tom Tunguz

OCTOBER 31, 2023

We should expect the advances in AI to improve sales efficiency, even if modestly. AI Efficiency Gains +2% Headcount Reduction ? But the dominant strategy has been to hire more reps while maintaining quotas rather than increasing quotas meaningfully - perhaps an artifact of the easy money era.

Headcount 179

Headcount Sales Hiring AI Cloud 179

Sales Hacker

MARCH 12, 2020

Like most things in life, hiring sales talent is a matter of timing. Especially since the best candidates with strong sales skills are usually snatched up within 10 days. That’s why it’s critical to overcome indecision and move quickly when recruiting sales talent. Is it unrealistic sales quotas?

Sales Hiring 76

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Compensation Underperforming Technical Team 76

SaaStr

MAY 31, 2023

Everyone is basically doing more with not much more headcount (see next point). #4. Growing Headcount, But Much More Slowly That Revenue. Headcount is up 29% year-over-year, but revenue is up 50%. Also you can see sales & marketing headcount is basically flat, while hiring is almost all in engineering / R&D.

Headcount 200

Headcount Scale Sales Hiring AWS 200

OpenView Labs

OCTOBER 2, 2019

This time every year, sales and sales operations teams work with their business partners in finance, marketing and other functions to set their annual sales plan for the coming year. One way to approach this complexity is to separate out the three key components of sales planning. Headcount Planning.

Headcount 41

Headcount Sales Hiring Scale Sales 41

Tom Tunguz

JUNE 20, 2020

We can derive the table above if we look over the entire respondent base and bucket headcount by ARR. The median startup with between 1-5M in ARR will have 12 engineers, 6 in sales and 3 in marketing. Meanwhile, the size of the marketing team increases only by 4X, compared to a 10X increase in sales and a 5X+ in engineering.

Scale 349

Scale Scaling Sales Hiring Software Review 349

SaaStr

JUNE 22, 2021

The other day I saw a VP of Sales flame out and resign with no notice from a SaaS company doing $10m ARR growing quickly. There were a lot of flags in this hire, but I remember one vividly. So I thought it might be helpful to brush off the topic of alignment between Sales and Marketing by updating a classic post on the topic.

Sales Recruiting 313

Sales Recruiting Scale Sales Hiring Revenue 313

Tom Tunguz

APRIL 5, 2020

On the brighter side, it is a resource for startups looking to hire as they grow. But starting that week, startups began reducing headcount by about 700 per day. ClassPass, one of the fitness startups to reduce headcount, reported a 95% drop in sales in 10 days. First, let’s look at layoffs by day.

Sales Recruiting 318

Sales Recruiting Startup Headcount Sales Hiring 318

Intercom, Inc.

OCTOBER 26, 2021

Getting the team right is one of the hardest parts of scaling sales. But no sales team can afford to grow without intention. While building a sales team, we’ve focused a lot on our sales culture. Here’s how we went about growing a sales team that is both world class and culture-additive.

Scale 160

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Sales 160

SaaStr

OCTOBER 6, 2019

And often, if you are capital efficient, your marketing cost will be close to $0 at this point (you are barely spending anything to acquire most customers), and your sales costs are pretty predictable. Generally speaking, one Director of Sales can manage about 8 closers, account execs, max. Why would this be?

Sales Hiring 234

Sales Hiring Scale Sales Venture Capital 234

SaaStr

JANUARY 2, 2021

Your sales headcount. Hire a real management team. Hire a VP of Sales that knows what they are doing. Hire a VP of Marketing that knows demand gen cold. Hire a VP of Marketing that knows demand gen cold. You’ll “magically” get more MQLs, and the funnel will be managed more efficiently.

Sales Hiring 307

Sales Hiring Headcount Pricing Market Segmentation 307

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 15, 2020

But to Go Big, almost everyone in SaaS at least eventually adds a sales team. But to scale it quickly added a very effective sales team : Yes, Atlassian for a long time had almost no “direct” sales team, well after the IPO. With, and through, a sales team. You don’t need 100% sales-driven revenue to Go Big.

Scale 341

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Headcount 341