Clouded Judgement

APRIL 11, 2024

Is Software Rebounding? It looks at the YoY dollar change in quarterly revenue from the hyperscalers (just looking at Azure / AWS because the data goes back further) going back a few years. Q4 Revenue Relative to Consensus Estimates Now let’s dive in to the financial results of Q4 starting with revenue.

Cloud 177

Cloud Software Azure AWS 177

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 18, 2022

Software itself and other departments get leverage. One thing that sneaks up on you in SaaS is just how many sales, marketing and revenue professionals you are going to need: First it sneaks up on you in the early days because the initial tiny team become so efficient. So as you begin to scale, say past $2m-$3m ARR, first do the math.

Scale 343

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Headcount 343

SaaStr

DECEMBER 11, 2020

Now more than ever, an independent software vendor’s (ISV’s) path to profitability depends upon the strength of their go-to-market strategy. And with nearly 70% of global revenue for ISVs currently derived from third-party channel sales , no other approach to distribution ensures the exposure and revenue of the channel.

Scale 280

Scale Scaling Marketplace as a Service Cloud 280

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 28, 2022

Dear SaaStr: What Are Some Signs That Your SaaS Marketing Programs Won’t Scale Well? Ultimately, all the best software companies get the majority of their new customers from word-of-mouth and referrals. Don’t Shortchange Second-Order Revenue. Don’t overindex on any individual campaign or initiative.

Scale 228

Scale Scaling Marketing SaaS 228

SaaStr

JANUARY 24, 2023

As SaaS founders are looking to scale and raise funding, it can be confusing and stressful to navigate in the uncertain market of the past few years. The Perfect Storm Established in 1962, OMERS Equity has built an impressive software portfolio, including companies like Skillshare, Shopify, Hopper, and GitLab. Sign up for free.

Scale 229

Scale Scaling Software Review Operational efficiency. 229

Clouded Judgement

JULY 21, 2023

Every week I’ll provide updates on the latest trends in cloud software companies. Subscribe now Are Software Companies Bad Businesses? There was some talk last week on the All-In podcast about software companies. The gold standard for all public software companies is GAAP net income in the fullness of time.

Cloud 130

Cloud Software Sales Hiring Scale 130

SaaStr

APRIL 19, 2024

To the OG software people who read SaaStr, Jason is “the guy,” Sam says. He’s the person that the founders of Hubspot and companies that make tens of millions of dollars want to learn about software from. EchoSign, which Adobe bought, had $12M in ARR, growing 100%, with 120% revenue retention and cash flow positive.

Engineering 254

Engineering Business Model Pricing Scaling 254

Tom Tunguz

JUNE 20, 2020

Today, we’re answering the question: how do teams grow as a startup scales? Software companies invest in engineering early and then the product matures, complement that engineering and product investment with go to market teams to commercialize the product. But in sales, a CRO is often hired at the $20-50M ARR range.

Scale 355

Scale Scaling Sales Hiring Software Review 355

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 24, 2020

Check out the low down on our sponsors for SaaStr Scale who are helping to make this event happen. Grab your seat for their 12:30 PM PST workshop on Scaling with Speed: How to Streamline Your Revenue Operations with Conga. Listen to The 3 Secrets to Unlocking Revenue Through Customer Trust with GuideCX on December 9 at 8 AM PST.

Scale 252

Scale Scaling Outsourced Development compliance 252

Clouded Judgement

DECEMBER 21, 2023

Subscribe now Is Software Rebounding? This is the first quarter we’ve heard that message, and a good leading indicator for the rest of the software buying universe. Q3 Revenue Relative to Consensus Estimates Now let’s dive in to the financial results of Q3 starting with revenue. net retention and CAC payback).

Cloud 177

Cloud Software Benchmarks Retention 177

SaaStr

OCTOBER 11, 2023

Monday has gone from $7m in 2017 to over $700m in revenue today, showcasing the sheer power of compounding revenue. Eran Zimman, monday.com’s co-founder and co-CEO, shares his secrets to scaling and growth in an unpredictable market. It’s a very flexible software that allows everyone to build their own solution.

Scale 164

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Banking 164

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 19, 2022

Rav Dhaliwal, Investor and Venture Partner at Crane Ventures , Lindsey Serafin, VP of Customer Success at Snyk.io , and Caitlin Sullivan, Director of Customer Success at Vanta, discuss what customer success is, who owns it, what customer metrics you should look at, and what you need to focus on if you want to scale digital customer success.

Sales Hiring 245

Sales Hiring Customer Success Scaling Construction 245

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 25, 2022

Scale-ups are exciting. Scaling to satisfy customers’ demands depends on innovation and foresight combined with enterprise-ready technology and the right partners. On top of considerable dedication, creating a scale-up requires a functional edge—a unique and unreplicable capability compared to the players in the industry.

Scale 231

Scale Scaling Marketplace as a Service Entrepreneurship 231

SaaStr

APRIL 12, 2022

The majority of its revenue is now from Bitcoin transactions, not “traditional” payments and software. And yet … and yet … its engine is all software and really SaaS. Its software and services business is the one with the real operating margins. At least still for now. It’s core.

Payments 273

Payments SaaS Payments Payment Services Revenue 273

FastSpring

APRIL 18, 2024

For many SaaS and software companies, international sales are a key part of their growth trajectories. FastSpring is an all-in-one payments platform for SaaS, software, and digital products businesses, including VAT and sales tax management, payment localization, and consumer support. Learn more about what DutchBasecamp does here.

Payment Methods 78

Payment Methods Payments SaaS Payments Merchant Services 78

SaaStr

JANUARY 6, 2021

How do you scale a company based that can be collaborative for everyone in your org — from finance to marketing? From the beginning, Airtable convinced themselves that they had a different category of product through the creation of a software creation platform that anyone can use. Challenges as CEO. Mentorship is crucial to success.

Scale 205

Scale Software Review Scaling Sales Hiring 205

Intercom, Inc.

SEPTEMBER 10, 2020

Applying data and science to scaling has become easier because of the shift that’s happened in the software industry over the past 15 years, from outside sales to inside sales. A data-driven framework for scaling. Mark’s latest ebook, The Science of Scaling , outlines a precise framework for success.

Scale 226

Scale Scaling Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring 226

SaaStr

MARCH 1, 2021

Q: Can SaaS free pilots and trials periods count towards gross revenue then deducted as a marketing expense? If it’s truly free — it isn’t revenue. Third, if you want credit for deals with future contracted revenue, but without immediate revenue — add a new metric “contracted revenue” and carefully explain it.

Revenue 265

Revenue Metrics Scaling Software 265

Totango

SEPTEMBER 22, 2023

, we’re accelerating the motion to customer success-led growth by introducing two new partnerships and nine technology integrations into the Totango software and ecosystem. Retention increases when customers get results, leading to increased purchasing and ultimately boosting enterprise revenue growth.

Enterprise 113

Enterprise Revenue Scale Innovation 113

Clouded Judgement

JUNE 20, 2023

The question on everyone’s mind - when will we see software re-accelerate? The real headwinds to software (tougher expansion, longer sales cycles / procurement, slower new business, budget crunches / RIFs, etc) started last August. And I’m optimistic we’ll see reacceleration in software by the end of the year.

Cloud 161

Cloud Software Benchmarks Scale 161

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 24, 2023

Doug Pepper, General Partner at ICONIQ Growth, has invested in software and SaaS companies for 22 years, from seed to growth stage. They initially double their ARR each year in scaling post $10M. Over the last ten years, ICONIQ Growth has partnered with over 90 companies, seeing them grow through critical phases.

Scale 214

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Venture Capital 214

SaaStr

APRIL 4, 2023

CIPIO Partners is a pan-European growth equity firm and early growth investor, primarily in software and software-enabled models. This means you can raise prices, add modules, and expand, increasing the average revenue per customer account (ARPA). Otherwise, things will slow down. What does that mean for your organization?

Scale 234

Scale Strategy Scaling Outbound Sales Team 234

SaaStr

JANUARY 5, 2022

So far in FY2022, 62% of our total revenue came from customers with more than one Box product, up from 57% in FY2021. If you get a customer to buy more software than they’re ready to, you may be excited when you ring the bell, but you’re going to pay later.”. Enter your email below for the latest SaaStr updates.

Scale 268

Scale Scaling Sales Hiring Software Review 268

Tom Tunguz

JANUARY 11, 2021

The first grows revenue twice as fast as the second. Let’s plot the current multiples of software companies to see if the shape appears in the current market. The vertical axis differs because most software companies are typically valued on forward multiple, not Price/Earnings (P/E). The answer is yes.

Software 248

Software Scale Pricing Scaling 248

Tom Tunguz

NOVEMBER 28, 2017

How quickly do the fastest growing software companies build their teams? Above, I’ve charted the headcount growth rate for 10 of the fastest growing software companies in recent history. Above, I’ve charted the headcount growth rate for 10 of the fastest growing software companies in recent history.

Headcount 168

Headcount Scaling Software Business 168

Clouded Judgement

SEPTEMBER 12, 2023

We will see this show up in revenue figures in a quarter or two. Regardless, as we round into Q3 we’ll start to “lap” the first tough quarters so it wouldn’t surprise me to see a number of companies accelerate their YoY revenue growth. ” Source: company filings Let’s get into some high level data.

Cloud 169

Cloud Software Benchmarks Retention 169

SaaStr

DECEMBER 26, 2023

The average public SaaS company now has hit $300,000 in revenue per employee or so on average. Almost Everyone’s Gotten Radically More Efficient in SaaS That’s a good metric to think about at scale now. But now, almost everyone at scale has the same incentive — they have to be cash-flow positive.

Venture Capital 283

Venture Capital Scaling AI Investment 283

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 9, 2021

In today’s SaaStr podcast episode, Harry Stebbings sits down with Ryan Bonnici, Chief Marketing Officer at Whereby to chat about how to market at scale. Prior to joining Whereby, a browser-based video meeting platform, Bonnici was previously CMO of the world’s leading software review platform G2.com Harry Stebbings.

Scale 157

Scale Scaling Sales Hiring Marketing 157

Clouded Judgement

APRIL 12, 2023

Less than half of the software universe is guiding above consensus, and the median guide has gone from ~2.5% Beating consensus revenue estimates is the first aspect of a successful quarter. This quarter more than half of cloud software businesses missed next quarters consensus. This is quite interesting.

Cloud 161

Cloud Software Benchmarks Retention 161

Andreessen Horowitz

AUGUST 4, 2020

Today, about 90% of public SaaS companies and the 2019 Forbes Cloud 100 have subscription-based revenue models. Now new fintech infrastructure companies have made it possible for SaaS businesses to add financial services alongside their core software product.

Scaling 145

Scaling SaaS Cloud Subscription 145

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 17, 2023

While the allure of customer acquisition can pull a founder’s attention, it’s equally important to dedicate resources to fighting churn and expanding revenue from existing customers. They discuss how Fox helped build a churn-fighting, upselling, and cross-selling machine that continues to generate revenue.

Retention 217

Retention Revenue Startup Sales Hiring 217

Tom Tunguz

DECEMBER 5, 2023

Mongo announcing earnings yesterday concludes this quarter’s index of software buyers. As the chart above shows, the software market is plateauing & some companies are rebounding. Second, each of these businesses has scaled, doubling or more in the last three years. Why is a flat growth rate something to cheer?

Cloud 272

Cloud Software Scaling Revenue 272

SaaStr

MAY 3, 2024

YCombinator recently put out its list of its Top 50 YC companies of all time based on revenues. Flock Safety: “How to Build out a Sales Org from 0 reps to ~100 in 18 months | FlockSafety ‘s CEO Garrety Langley” This was a fun one as Flock Safety was rapidly scaling. More than half of them, in fact!

Scale 178

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Innovation 178

SaaStr

DECEMBER 20, 2023

They were $1.7B+ ARR in October , so let’s call it close to $2B at the end of the year, growing 40%+ at that scale –and profitable! (or Canva hasn’t seen any “macro impacts” to revenue growth, nor have a number of other SaaS leaders that sell in large part outside of tech. #2. But Canva is doing it right.

AWS 262

AWS B2C AI Scaling 262

SaaStr

MAY 5, 2022

Podium sales leaders, EVP of Sales Than Hancock, and Regional Sales Manager Carlie Adams recently led a session on how they’ve grown the team at the cloud-based software company. Podium has grown from a 1 million annual recurring revenue (ARR) company to doing over 100 million in ARR in their time there. . Key Takeaways.

Scale 224

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Sales 224

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 27, 2023

Additionally, they had to figure out how they would sustain the revenue stream to retain the staff. They also hired a VP of Partners who knew how to scale B2B software. Something will inevitably go wrong when trying to scale your company the Storyblok way, but these tips can help you make them right: Trust your instincts.

Scale 203

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scaling 203

SaaStr

APRIL 19, 2023

So one large category of software spend is on Point of Sale systems. But “POS” systems and software are everywhere, and are a lot more than just Toast and Square. And their mix of software, payments and hardware revenue drives up the total deal size — but puts a lot of pressure on margins.

Payment Solutions 246

Payment Solutions Point of Sale Payments SaaS Payments 246