GTM 151: How to Scale Vertical SaaS in 2025 | Dennis Lyandres (Ex-CRO, Procore)

26 snips

Jun 17, 2025

In this discussion, Dennis Lyandres, former Chief Revenue Officer of Procore, shares insights on the transformation of SaaS companies. He emphasizes the integration of people, product, and go-to-market strategies for success. Dennis highlights how AI can be a game changer when adopted thoughtfully. He also discusses the importance of talent management in vertical SaaS and how strong customer relationships can drive growth. Finally, he explores innovative ways to build effective teams and align them with strategic objectives.

Ask episode

AI Snips

Chapters

Transcript

Episode notes

INSIGHT

People, Product, GTM Triad

Dennis Lyandres highlights the integration of people, product, and go-to-market as the key pillars for company success.
A cohesive strategy among these reduces risk and unlocks excellence.

ADVICE

Craft a Talent Strategy

Establish a clear people strategy aligned with your product and GTM plans.
Tailor talent acquisition and development based on organizational needs and future AI-first priorities.

ANECDOTE

Procore's Multi-product Expansion

Procore began with general contractors before expanding into financial products for owners, following the money and pain points in the construction workflow.
Similar strategies apply across vertical SaaS by addressing workflows and stakeholders stepwise.

Get the Snipd Podcast app to discover more snips from this episode

Get the app

Dennis Lyandres is an Advisor with ICONIQ and a Board Member of Speedchain and CaptivateIQ. Dennis amassed incredible insights through his experience as the Chief Revenue Officer of Procore, where he helped grow the company from $10M to $900M+ in revenue and guided it through a successful IPO. At Procore, he led all customer-facing functions—Sales, Marketing, CS, RevOps, and BD. He’s now an investor, advisor, and board member to iconic B2B SaaS companies, and one of the most respected voices in GTM for vertical SaaS.

Discussed in this Episode:

Why the best SaaS companies align people, product, and GTM into one unified strategy
Using AI as a GTM advantage starts with a crawl-walk-run approach
Scaling multi-product in vertical SaaS means following the money and the pain
GTM leaders win when they speak product and co-own strategy with engineering
Customer relationships are your most undervalued strategic growth lever
Your top 5% of talent deserve a purpose-built strategy to maximize impact
Lean AI teams are redefining what’s possible with just a handful of operators

Highlights:

03:00 Dennis’s journey as the Chief Revenue Officer at Procore: from $10M to IPO

05:00 The “People, Product, GTM” triad and AI-native orgs

07:00 Why vertical SaaS startups need a talent strategy (and most companies lack one)

09:30 Multi-product GTM strategy explained via Procore and other verticals

13:00 How Go-To-Market teams can show up better for product teams

18:00 Building deep customer strategy across functions in a B2B startup

23:00 Price’s Law and the T30 program for top performers within a revenue organization

24:30 Lean AI startup: what it is and what it isn’t

30:00 Crawl-walk-run AI adoption in Go-To-Market teams

Guest Speaker Links (Dennis Lyandres):

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dlyandres/
Speedchain: https://www.speedchain.com/
ICONIQ: https://www.iconiqcapital.com/

Host Speaker Links (Sophie Buonassisi):

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sophiebuonassisi/
Newsletter: https://substack.com/@sophiebuonassisi

Sponsors: TriNet

Every early-stage founder is told to focus on product and growth. But behind every product launch and revenue milestone is a team – and building that team is one of the hardest and important parts of the journey.

“Build the team that builds the company.” – that is part of your go-to-market strategy responsible for growth.

Hiring the right people, keeping them supported, and creating the infrastructure to help them thrive is critical.

TriNet exists to make that easier. TriNet’s full suite of HR solutions is designed to support companies at critical inflection points – from early traction to scale.

Learn more at https://trinet.com/gtmnow

The GTM Podcast
The GTM Podcast is a weekly podcast featuring interviews with the top 1% GTM executives, VCs, and founders. Conversations reveal the unshared details behind how they have grown companies, and the go-to-market strategies responsible for shaping that growth.

Visit gtmnow.com for more episodes and other interesting content.