SaaStr

APRIL 29, 2025

250+ speakers. 12,000+ SaaS leaders. 100B+ in market cap. 250+ speakers. 12,000+ SaaS leaders. 100B+ in market cap. 250+ speakers. 12,000+ SaaS leaders. 100B+ in market cap.

AI Search 158

AI Search AI New CTO Scale 158

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 15, 2020

And, when you do, do you even think about sale tax compliance? vary on how they handle sales tax and SaaS. It can be confusing to understand how and where you should charge sales tax. Let’s explore a few more ways in which sales tax compliance could impact your growing business. Here’s why you should. .

Payment Services 335

Payment Services compliance SaaS Payments Scale 335

TechEmpower SaaS

MARCH 4, 2024

Key Functions with High Impact Generative AI is revolutionizing sales by enabling dynamic pricing and personalized customer interactions, boosting conversion rates and customer satisfaction. Post-sale, AI analyzes customer data to improve service and loyalty, making it a cornerstone of modern sales methodologies.

Generative AI 443

Generative AI CTO Hire AI Sales Recruiting 443

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 25, 2025

Including: CEO Snowflake CEO HubSpot CEO DropBox CEO Descript CEO Clio CEO Flock Safety CEO Own CRO ServiceTitan CMO Databricks CMO Infinite Reality CTO Rubrik CCO Canva CCO Bill CCO GitHub VP AI Wiz CEO Calendly and 100s more!! Competitive Intelligence and Market Insights and New!!

Sales Recruiting 180

Sales Recruiting Scale CTO Hire Sales Hiring 180

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 15, 2021

There’s a slide I see again and again from start-ups: 2 of the early sales reps are at 100% of quota, sometimes 150%-200%. So why so often, do only 2 of the first 8-10 sales reps perform? They get CTO training. Usually, this is sort of solved when you find a strong first VP of Sales. Simplify your sales process.

Scale 348

Scale CTO Hire Sales Hiring New CTO 348

SaaStr

JANUARY 18, 2022

I thought my sales team would leave quickly. My VP of Sales and the team stayed for 2.5 Most surprisingly, my CTO — the most start-up-ey guy I know — is still there. You may be asked to own new stuff beyond just what your company / app does. You don’t have to work as hard. See previous point. And it is hard to predict.

Payment Solutions 350

Payment Solutions New CTO Payments Payment Services 350

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 12, 2021

“Mastermind Masterclass: The SaaS Org Chart by Series with David Sacks” David Sacks, founder of Craft Ventures and Yammer, and ex-COO, leads us on a new Mastermind class on opening day. #2. “Mastermind Masterclass: The Most Common SaaS Sales Potholes and How to Avoid Them with Mark Roberge” Masterminds seem popular!

Scale 305

Scale New CTO CTO B2C 305

SaaStr

OCTOBER 29, 2021

Some leaders like Slack have seen the same, but most Cloud leaders at scale with high NRR end up getting more and more of their revenue from their existing base, not new customers. Rather, it uses overage events to trigger a call from sales to buy more. #4. CEO Spencer Skates owns 8.5%, CTO Curtis Liu 8.0%. This is rare.

Scale 312

Scale CTO Hire New CTO CTO 312

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. You’re not building a product or getting any new customers. Q: When is the Right Time to Hire a VP of Sales?

Scale 290

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting AI 290

SaaStr

JANUARY 19, 2024

A good / great employee can become 10x in a new environment was part of Auren’s point. My co-founder and our CTO were both wicked smart. At Adobe Sign / EchoSign, I knew a lot of our sales team, from Brendon Cassidy to Sam Blond (now at Founders Fund and ex-CRO at Brex) were great. I saw this live in my first start-up.

Sales Hiring 300

Sales Hiring CTO Hire New CTO CTO 300

SaaStr

JULY 4, 2022

I thought my sales team would leave quickly. My VP of Sales and the team stayed for 2.5 Most surprisingly, my CTO — the most start-up-ey guy I know — is still there. You may be asked to own new stuff beyond just what your company / app does. You don’t have to work as hard. See previous point. 10+ years later (!).

SaaS Payments 305

SaaS Payments New CTO Payment Solutions Payments 305

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 217

New CTO SaaS Sales CTO 217

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 7, 2023

The goal is to help each other learn something new, find mentorships, create partnerships, and exchange strategies. 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.

VP of Engineering 298

VP of Engineering Technical Cofounder Outsourcing Services CTO Coach 298

SaaStr

JULY 21, 2020

Your investors and others will learn a lot more hearing about sales from your VP of Sales, your CTO co-founder … and not you. But there are 1,000+ new firms since 2016 alone. All-hands meetings, board meetings, whenever. Yes, you are the CEO. But everyone hears from you all the time. Bring Your Investors Together.

Sales Recruiting 363

Sales Recruiting New CTO Scale CTO 363

Tom Tunguz

OCTOBER 28, 2024

On Monday, at TC Disrupt Colin Zima CEO of Omni , Jordan Tigani CEO of Motherduck , Daniel Svnova CEO of Superlinked & Toby Mao CTO of Tobiko Data who are leading the evolution of the Post Modern Data Stack discussed the trends they are seeing. Customers are excited about new architectures that significantly reduce cost.

Trends 248

Trends Data New CTO CTO 248

SaaStr

JUNE 25, 2023

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. A great CTO usually can solve this problem just in time to save the customers, but without one, revenue stalls. Can sell but can’t build great software.

Startup 262

Startup New CTO CTO Investment 262

SaaStr

JUNE 18, 2022

Bonney Pelley, SVP, Strategy + Operations @ New Relic. Patricia Hanna, VP Americas Sales Ops @ Confluent. Shradha Kothari, Chief of Staff, SVP & GM North America Sales @ Twilio. Elias Torres, CTO @ Drift. Bonney Pelley, SVP, Strategy + Operations @ New Relic. Patricia Hanna, VP Americas Sales Ops @ Confluent.

CTO 285

CTO Scale New CTO AWS 285

SaaStr

JANUARY 22, 2021

Ciara Peter (Gainsight VP of Product & Design) and Mickey Alon (CTO & Founder of Gainsight PX) share their practical tips for product leaders looking to achieve business growth. Every year, millions of new products are created and launched. What does it mean to make your product the star in your SaaS growth strategy?

Scale 290

Scale New CTO CTO Acquisition 290

SaaStr

MARCH 7, 2021

Yes, you can manage the sales team yourself. Cash was tight and I didn’t know any great VPs of Biz Dev, so between myself and my VPs of Sales, Product and Customer Success, we all jointly managed our key partners. 5/ Moving from CTO-led -> VPE-led dev team. 8/ Specializing the sales team earlier. More here.

Part-Time VPE 299

Part-Time VPE Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale 299

SaaStr

MAY 3, 2022

Bonney Pelley, SVP, Strategy + Operations @ New Relic. Patricia Hanna, VP Americas Sales Ops @ Confluent. Shradha Kothari, Chief of Staff, SVP & GM North America Sales @ Twilio. Elias Torres, CTO @ Drift. Josh Reeves, CEO & Co-Founder @ Gusto. Avlok K, CEO @ AngelList. Farrah B, VP Business Operations @ Cribl.

New CTO 265

New CTO Scale CTO AWS 265

SaaStr

JANUARY 12, 2022

. “That it was much easier to do more in order to keep that customer than to get a new “top” customer. 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. Did we prioritize the roadmap right?

CTO Hire 328

CTO Hire Sales Hiring New CTO CTO 328

SaaStr

JULY 13, 2023

Q: Where Should SDRs Report — Marketing or Sales? A VP of Sales might seem the logical place to have your first SDR team report. It’s too much to learn on the fly for most new VPs of Sales. Sales leaders who have only done inbound and responded to leads aren’t those people. Likely within the hour that day.

CTO Hire 241

CTO Hire Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale 241

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 17, 2020

There was also a highly efficient inbound sales model. In fact, there is currently no field sales organization! If the PLG strategy is implemented well with a quick time to value, the cost of acquiring new customers and upselling the customers provides for a very efficient business model.”.

New CTO 275

New CTO CTO Benchmarks Consulting 275

SaaStr

DECEMBER 4, 2020

Not launching 3 Truly Game-Changing Features doesn’t mean you didn’t ship any new code or features. That opens up entirely new segments of the market. A Truly Game-Changing Feature is something: That makes your customers’ and prospects’ jaws drop. That materially increases close rates.

New CTO 256

New CTO CTO Engineering Investment 256

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 18, 2020

What makes a bad CTO? Is SaaS Sales really that lucrative? As the CEO of a startup, what should I tell my employees who keep asking for raises after they realized we just raised a new round of funding? (74k views). What were the signs you missed before you lost a major customer? (A A classic ) (72k views). 52k views).

Venture Capital 252

Venture Capital New CTO CTO Startup 252

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 264

Scale New CTO CTO Scaling 264

SaaStr

JULY 14, 2022

We had Lew Cirne, Founder & CEO of New Relic, Dharmesh Shah, Co-Founder & CTO of HubSpot and for the first time at Annual, we added office hours with the top VCs in SaaS. total attendees, e.g., a CEO + a VP of Sales and a VP of Customer Success, or two Co-Founders, or CEO + CTO, etc. 2020 SaaStr Annual At Home.

Scale 312

Scale Sales Recruiting CTO Hire New CTO 312

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 25, 2020

Just like filing your income tax returns or hanging that state-mandated safety poster up in your break room, sales tax is a back-office pain point, not a profit center. . That makes sales tax compliance easy to ignore… until it becomes a problem. . Why is sales tax such a pain for SaaS companies? There are a few reasons.

Merchant Services 199

Merchant Services Technical Review Scale Sales Hiring 199

SaaStr

JULY 5, 2024

Some are decades-old problems, while others have emerged from this new world we’re in. GTM Mistake #1: A VP of Sales That Can’t Sell or Demo the Product Mistake number one has always been an issue, and it’s the number one reason startups struggle in today’s world. They hire a VP of Sales who doesn’t want to sell or learn the product.

CTO Hire 211

CTO Hire Sales Hiring New CTO Venture Capital 211

SaaStr

OCTOBER 28, 2019

Well, we did the heavy lifting and highlighted a few here for you… Marianna Tessel, Intuit CTO + Cathy Polinsky, Stitch Fix CTO + Robin Ducot, Survey Monkey CTO. We’re especially excited about this all-star, CTO panel from three publicly traded companies. appeared first on SaaStr.

New CTO 108

New CTO CTO Scale Engineering 108

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 29, 2020

But I forced us to hire him, over my CTO’s strong objection and my VPE’s grudging acknowledgment we had no choice. You have to try new things. Bob is a great VP of Marketing or Sales at Box or Salesforce or Netsuite or wherever. In my first start-up, there was one engineer we had no choice about.

Part-Time VPE 290

Part-Time VPE Sales Hiring CTO Hire Scale 290

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 21, 2019

Since 2010 we’ve seen more startups, funds, and capital than ever before, but with this drastic increase, investors are seeing unexpected new trends reshaping the future of the industry. The panel that we are in is called Is Seed the New Series A, and this is a question that I’ve been asking informally yesterday and today.

New CTO 173

New CTO Sales Hiring B2C CTO Hire 173

SaaStr

OCTOBER 2, 2023

With the overall trend of budget scrutiny and more oversight on spend, it may come as no surprise that the data shows that most folks who came as a team brought their: CFO CCO CTO and CRO in that order of popularity.

Trends 278

Trends New CTO CTO Data 278

SaaStr

JUNE 1, 2021

Co-founder and CTO Dharmesh Shah shared with us how they got there — and the top mistakes they made — just 3 quarters after their IPO. We have someone that probably 98 percent of you know virtually or socially in some sense, Dharmesh Shah, founder and CTO of HubSpot. Which brings me to sales and marketing.

Part-Time VPE 296

Part-Time VPE Technical Cofounder CTO Hire New CTO 296

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 11, 2022

They have service and all this, but the second cloud for them was sales. They wanted to sell the Amplitude product, I forget, to sales or somebody else, and that was their mistake. Jason Lemkin: I think I noticed a pattern, and I wrote it up a couple of years ago and refreshed it, and then I’ll add a new anecdote.

Outsourcing Services 243

Outsourcing Services Banking CTO Hire New CTO 243

Intercom, Inc.

FEBRUARY 16, 2022

We identified some “ known unknowns” too; problems we needed to solve, but didn’t know how just yet – like integrating the new region into our billing system. And so our former CTO and co-founder Ciaran Lee decided we were just going to start. We introduced virtually no new software, services, or approaches into our Europe buildout.

Scale 234

Scale New CTO Engineering CTO 234

SaaStr

JANUARY 17, 2024

Some of the biggest use cases for AI in the enterprise are across customer support, sales and marketing, and engineering — ie helping developers test code and troubleshoot issues. Benjamin added, “I think a lot of people think about this new AI technology as something that’s gonna just come in and like work from day one.

AI 298

AI Enterprise Artificial Intelligence compliance 298