Here's another episode that is just incredibly valuable for CEOs and CMOs at early stage SaaS firms. Whether you're a services firm moving to SaaS, bootstrapping, or pre-launch, there's a wealth of insight shared by Amit Bivas, VP of Global Marketing at Optimove.

Optimove is a marketing SaaS that helps companies to communicate right message to right segment at the right time... consistent with the micro-audiences we hear leading edge CMOs talk about -- targeting smaller and smaller cohorts to act on their motivations and intent.

Bivas explains how Optimove helps large enterprises to use data as a differentiator. In particular he talks about how it helps commoditized products and brands to create a better customer experience to create repeat purchase. And to customize that experience at scale and as their preferences change.

Optimove was originally a services firm taking data from retailers and wholesalers to understand how customers migrated from "state to state" or segment to segment. Early on, the founders knew they wanted to become a software company that could scale. All revenues from its services business were invested to build the software so they could have a platform to scale. Since it was started as a moonlighting project, they were able to funnel a lot of revenues back to product development.

Among the highlights from this episode:

• When you start as a service provider you gain a lot of experience and understanding before you build the product. And those customers who you are selling services to can become your first customers for the software. And since you know their issues so intimately, you can build the roadmap based on real-world customer experience. 
• You do need to be prepared, however, for the reality that not every services customer is going to want your software, and you put at risk the services relationship when you transition to a software company - people still want their hands held. 
• You need to make sure that your critical mass is centered around the product not the service for a variety of reasons - ability to scale and when you do take investment, services are not as highly valued as SaaS revenues. 
• Moving consultants into customer success and solutions engineering roles also helps support the transition from services to SaaS.

A great interview and insights for those considering a startup or transitioning from an established services company to a Software-as-a-Service company.

Let us know what you think!

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