Andreessen Horowitz

OCTOBER 16, 2023

One of the toughest challenges for founders — and especially technical founders who are used to focusing so much on product features over sales — is striking “product-market fit”. What does this mean for product design and product management? the night before it was to IPO).

Product Marketing 81

Product Marketing Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting 81

SaaStr

DECEMBER 16, 2023

We’ve discussed most before individually, but let me throw ’em together: It may well take 24 months to get to true product-market fit and Initial Traction. If you can’t do the time, don’t do the startup. You have to love, or at least commit to, recruiting constantly. If you budget any less, you probably will fail.

Part-Time VPE 211

Part-Time VPE CTO Hire Sales Recruiting VPCs (Virtual Private Cloud) 211

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. We were coming off an environment where startup funding was as fruitful as ever. On the sales side, people hired way too much. More salespeople do not equal more sales.

Sales Hiring 245

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Headcount 245

Point Nine Land

OCTOBER 23, 2023

P9 Panel on Hiring Sales Leaders — Founders Summit 2023 “You are going to fire your first sales manager!” — A lesson too many founders learn the hard way. At Point Nine, we aspire to continuously share what we learn with our community and the extended startup ecosystem.

Sales Hiring 125

Sales Hiring Scale Technical Advisors Technical Cofounder 125

Tom Tunguz

AUGUST 2, 2019

If you must choose a long term headquarters for your startup, call an executive recruiter who focuses in that city. VP Engineering, VP Product, VP Sales, VP Customer Success, VP Marketing, or VP Operations. After establishing product market fit, the startups grow their management team to scale.

Sales Recruiting 219

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Startup Scale 219

SaaStr

JUNE 2, 2023

In 2020-2021, many SaaS startups faced a unique challenge. CRO at Wiz, Colin Jones, shares how this traditional startup evolved, thrived and grew from 0 to $100 million in just two years. Recruit diverse leaders The goal of hiring a revenue leader is to put gasoline on finding product market fit success.

Sales Recruiting 206

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Branding 206

SaaStr

AUGUST 30, 2022

Great product, driven team, good early product-market fit, great vision. But after that, it starts to break down when you have to recruit a true management team, and in many cases, additional capital. They’ll know … Who can best recruit a management team? Check, check, check and check.

Sales Recruiting 223

Sales Recruiting Technical Cofounder Scale Investment 223

Tom Tunguz

NOVEMBER 9, 2019

The most frequent mishire in startups is the first head of marketing. Many different disciplines fall under marketing’s purview. The question facing founders recruiting marketers is: which is the most important to prioritize? Each of these kinds of marketers have critical skills for a startup.

Scale 218

Scale Startup Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring 218

Tom Tunguz

NOVEMBER 16, 2015

Mark Roberge, the Chief Revenue Officer at Hubspot, has spent 20 years in startups. As he told me a few days ago, he has observed the lack of sales management and sales execution skills as one of the most consistent deficiencies limiting the potential of early stage SaaS companies. The first step is hiring a sales leader.

Sales Hiring 184

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Startup Compensation 184

Tom Tunguz

NOVEMBER 22, 2015

On December 2, SaaS Office Hours at Redpoint will welcome Maia Josebachvilli , VP of Strategy and People at Greenhouse, a fast growing recruiting software company. Before Greenhouse, Maia founded Urban Escapes, a DC-based startup she sold to LivingSocial. She was also selected for Inc’s 30 under 30.

Sales Recruiting 100

Sales Recruiting Metrics SaaS Sales Funnel 100

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 13, 2022

When You Fall Out of Product-Market Fit. The Simple Reason Startups That Just Raised $100s of Millions Are Doing Layoffs. SaaStr 603: SaaStr CRO Confidential Presents the Ultimate Guide to Sales Compensation, Quotas and Recruiting with SaaStr CEO and Founder, Jason Lemkin. Top Podcasts This Week: 1.

Sales Recruiting 214

Sales Recruiting AWS Compensation Enterprise 214

OpenView Labs

JUNE 3, 2021

If you aren’t clear on what product marketing is, how it’s different from product management, and what the responsibilities of a product marketer are, you’re not alone. Engineering manages IT. Hiring managers take on HR responsibilities. CEOs “hit the streets” and sell.

Product Marketing 93

Product Marketing Sales Hiring Startup Scale 93

SaaStr

MAY 6, 2021

A CRO owns and directs the strategy over a company’s revenue cycle, but there’s not a set standard for operational or management decisions: in addition to sales and sales development, they might be responsible for customer success, lead generation and pipelines, and even marketing and brand development.

Sales Hiring 228

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Interviewing Revenue 228

SaaStr

JUNE 15, 2021

The Return to the Startup Game. Says Bansal, “You should be doing what you enjoy…I realized I really enjoyed the journey of building a startup.” Product-Market Fit: There’s no shortcut –– finding the perfect target will always take time and hard work to get right. What Was Equally Challenging.

Sales Recruiting 190

Sales Recruiting Scale Software Delivery Travel 190

SaaStr

AUGUST 20, 2020

343: Kyle Parrish is the Head of Sales @ Figma, the company that helps teams create, test and ship better designs from start to finish. In Today’s Episode We Discuss: * How Kyle made his way into the world of SaaS and sales and came to be Head of Sales at one of the fastest-growing companies in Figma. What worked?

Sales Hiring 192

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Technical Advisors 192

Intercom, Inc.

MAY 16, 2018

Despite the mountain of evidence contradicting the mantra of “if you build it, they will come”, it’s still extremely prevalent among product-first companies. In this article, you’ll learn how to: Understand the role of product marketing. Start creating your product marketing plan.

Product Marketing 223

Product Marketing Strategy Marketing Sales Recruiting 223

SaaStr

JANUARY 24, 2024

Sales reps were hosting 4-6 calls daily but most of these calls were early demos or top-of-funnel discovery calls Sales was closing really small deals on one end while talking to really large companies with hundreds of thousands of people on the other. As a startup, it’s tempting to try and do everything.

Scale 217

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Revenue 217

Intercom, Inc.

SEPTEMBER 1, 2021

That’s why some of Intercom’s first marketing hires were product marketers and why we’ve had a “seat at the table” from the early days of the company. . Product marketing looks different in every company, but one common trend is that many product marketing managers (PMMs) feel undervalued.

Product Marketing 138

Product Marketing Marketing Sales Hiring Scale 138

Sales Hacker

OCTOBER 30, 2018

Welcome to Sales Hacker’s first-ever Influential Women in Sales list! In this exclusive list, we wanted to honor not just female leaders that promote their own sales platform (no shame in that!) They say “You can’t be what you can’t see,” and the sales floor is no exception.

Sales Recruiting 111

Sales Recruiting VP of Engineering Scale Sales Hiring 111

Tom Tunguz

JUNE 11, 2020

A recruiter in the audience submitted a question often discussed in startup boardrooms. The head of product would prefer someone with product marketing experience. And when I say pillar, I mean like a product marketing problem, a growth problem, or brand marketing problem. Thank you, Hollie!

Sales Hiring 248

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Product Marketing Acquisition 248

The Angel VC

APRIL 1, 2017

At the excellent SaaStr Annual 2016 conference about a year ago, a very experienced SaaS CEO said on stage that an internal recruiter can be a startup CEO’s secret superpower. I couldn’t agree more, and I think startups should make that hire sooner rather than later. Here’s why.

Sales Hiring 168

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Startup Software Review 168

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 14, 2023

Whether you’re just starting out in SaaS or have a successful SaaS startup, founders and startup teams can learn a lot from those who have found success in the industry through its ups and downs. In this Ask Me Anything Part 1, Lemkin answers the questions: Many VCs talk about funding, yet you’re so focused on sales.

Outsourcing Services 200

Outsourcing Services Sales Hiring Scale Sales Recruiting 200

Kellblog

JULY 17, 2022

In general, I think branding is a potential marketing rathole for startups, particularly early-stage ones. Some startups put the cart in front of the horse. Create a product. Get product-market fit (PMF), i.e., determine some problem you solve for some person with some product. Go sell some software.

Branding 132

Branding Startup Software Sales Recruiting 132

SaaStr

JULY 25, 2021

They talked about product adoption, sales alignment, freemium models and lessons they have learned throughout their successful SaaS careers. As two CEO who love the art of sales and scaling, this one really was special. And then some track record of execution either as the new startup or in the past.

Sales Recruiting 242

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale VP of Engineering 242

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 Product. Head of Sales. Head of Marketing.

CTO Hire 237

CTO Hire Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting CTO 237

SaaStr

DECEMBER 15, 2020

I meet with great VPs of Sales and Product in particular who are Ready. I’d like to recruit you to be a VP at one of my companies, but I get it. You’re going to have to be the VP of Sales, Customer Success, Marketing and probably Product in the early days. It’s time. I get it.

Sales Recruiting 363

Sales Recruiting SaaS Interviewing Consulting 363

Intercom, Inc.

SEPTEMBER 10, 2020

It’s an approach that’s served him well along the road to building the HubSpot sales team, where he was CRO for nine years. That experience led to his bestselling book, The Sales Acceleration Formula. Yet in Mark’s experience working with and mentoring startups, he’s found that many entrepreneurs go with intuition over information.

Scale 226

Scale Scaling Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring 226

SaaStr

JULY 1, 2020

An open discussion with Sam Blond, CSO at Brex, and Kristen Habacht, VPS at Atlassian, about adjusting their sales process during Covid-19. Kristen Habacht runs EDR sales at Atlassian, which I got a check today, $40 billion-$50 billion company. She manages a huge global team. Four, people in the sale? Jason Lemkin: None.

Merchant Services 173

Merchant Services Scale Sales Recruiting Sales 173

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 1, 2021

That you absolutely, positively, have to only hire “Rockstars” in your startups. If you don’t think you need a great VP of Sales, Product, Marketing, Customer Success, and Engineering — then all that all that means is you’ve never worked with a great one. The very best of the best.

Sales Hiring 271

Sales Hiring Part-Time VPE Scale Sales Recruiting 271

Intercom, Inc.

APRIL 25, 2019

If you’re reading this, you might be familiar with Paul Graham’s famous article “ Startup=Growth ,” where he lays out the difference between traditional businesses and startups. Paul Graham puts it like this: “A startup is a company designed to grow fast”. Making sure culture scales as you grow.

Scale 136

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scaling 136

OpenView Labs

FEBRUARY 3, 2022

As part of our last three annual finance and operating benchmarks surveys, we’ve asked nearly 2,000 startup founders and leaders of B2B SaaS businesses this simple question: “What’s keeping you up at night?”. It’s simply about which areas startup founders feel like they may be coming up short, not doing enough, or missing the mark.

Sales Hiring 82

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Startup 82

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 174

Part-Time VPE Scale Sales Hiring CTO Hire 174

Tom Tunguz

DECEMBER 9, 2015

As a startup scales and surpasses its first organizational breaking point of 8 employees, it’s time to start thinking about organizational design. The strategy a startup chooses in their market should determine their organizational design. People spans recruiting, training and development. Google is a good example.

Sales Recruiting 102

Sales Recruiting Startup Scale Systems Review 102

Sales Hacker

NOVEMBER 4, 2020

I was the new Vice President of International Sales & Managing Director for a work management software company called Wrike. Starting Your International Sales Team. The key to starting an international sales team is having the right people in your landing team. A mercenary is driven by the sale.

Sales Hiring 99

Sales Hiring Scale Sales Recruiting Sales 99

Tom Tunguz

APRIL 14, 2019

Since writing The AI Agency: A Novel GTM for Machine Learning Startups , I’ve been meeting many companies who operate this way. These startups use machine learning to disrupt an industry traditionally dominated by agencies: law, accounting, recruiting, translation, debt collection, marketing…the list is long.

AI 191

AI Sales Recruiting Underperforming Technical Team Machine Learning 191

Tom Tunguz

FEBRUARY 24, 2015

Once a startup has found an initial product market fit, the business must evolve the way it models its growth. Before product market fit, a startup’s financial projections focus on costs. The Fundamental Unit of SaaS growth is the atomic go-to-market team of a startup.

Sales Recruiting 113

Sales Recruiting Revenue Startup Sales Hiring 113

Sales Hacker

MARCH 17, 2021

While every entrepreneur dreams of scaling their startup into a multi-million dollar company, many do not understand all that goes into that dream. Strict sales volume does go a long way in achieving long-term revenue growth, but processes and cross-department alignment are what allow sales volumes to scale in the first place.

Scale 93

Scale Revenue Startup Sales Recruiting 93