The Official SaaStr Podcast: SaaS | Founders | Investors

Dan Reich is the Founder & CEO @ Troops.ai, the startup that is the ultimate slackbot for sales teams. To date, Dan has raised over $17m in VC funding with Troops from many friends of the show including Felicis Ventures, Founder Collective, First Round, Nextview, Susa Ventures and even Slack. As for Dan, he is also the Co-Founder and President of TULA, a private equity backed health and beauty business that has developed the world's first line of probiotic skincare products. Before that, Dan was a Co-Founder of Spinback (acquired by Buddy Media in May 2011, then acquired by Salesforce in June 2012). In Today’s Episode We Discuss: How Dan made his way into the world of SaaS with the founding of Spinback? How that led to his founding of the ultimate slackbot for sales teams in Troops? What does Dan really mean when he says “account based collaboration”? What is this a transition from? In terms of tracking and analysis, how does this change when making the move from tracking individual performance to team performance around an account? What can one do to actively implement this? What is key to a successful transition to this style of selling? What does Dan mean when he says, “sales teams are not working together the way we think they are”? What can sales leaders do to actively ensure their sales team is acting in unison? Where do many sales leaders go wrong here? How does Dan think about post mortems when an account is lost or won? How does Dan prevent dips in morale when sharing the loss of a sale? With scaling orgs, siloes are often created, why does Dan think many silos come into existence? At what stage does Dan really see them become a problem and cracks in the org begin to show? What can leaders do to instantly reduce the effect of silos? How does Dan think about controlling the noise to action ratio with the firehose of data at our disposal today? Dan’s 60 Second SaaStr: What does Dan know now that he wishes he had known at the beginning? What is the right time to train your sales team? The right way to structure sales comp plans? Read the full transcript on our blog. If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here: Jason Lemkin Harry Stebbings SaaStr Dan Reich

Qualtrics Co-Founder and CEO Ryan Smith sits down with SaaStr Founder and CEO Jason Lemkin as Ryan reflects on the survey software maker's acquisition by SAP this year. The company was acquired this November in an $8B deal ahead of its planned IPO. This is SaaStr’s founder favorites series where you can hear some of the best of the best of SaaStr Annual’s Speakers. Missed the session? Here’s what Jason and Ryan talk about: Why did Qualtrics turn down a $500M acquisition offer in 2012? What did Qualtrics’ path to fundraising look like? How to build lifelong customers Capital efficiency (and dilution) If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here: Jason Lemkin SaaStr

Erica Schultz is Chief Revenue Officer @ New Relic, the company that gives you the real time insights your software driven business needs to innovate faster. Prior to their IPO, New Relic raised over $214m in funding from some of the best in the business including Benchmark, Insight Venture Partners and Blackrock, to name a few. As for Erica, under her CRO role, she leads all go-to-market functions including Marketing, Sales, Operations, Customer Success, Services, and Support. Prior to New Relic, Erica served as Executive Vice President of Global Sales and Customer Success at LivePerson and before that, Erica had a 16-year tenure with Oracle Corporation, where she founded and led numerous teams within the sales organization, including pioneering the company’s cloud business, and leading teams for North American and Latin American markets. In Today’s Episode We Discuss: How Erica made her way into the world of SaaS and came to be Chief Revenue Officer @ New Relic? What were some of her biggest takeaways from her incredible 16 year journey with Oracle? Why does Erica believe that enterprise is a “company sport”? Why does each department need to re-platform when making the move to enterprise? How can founders know when is the right time to make the move from SMB to enterprise? Where does Erica often see founders make mistakes with this scaling? How does the move to enterprise fundamentally impact the sales team? How does the structure of the sales team change with the move? How does the role of marketing change with the move to enterprise? How does this move impact the relationship between sales and marketing? How should compensation plans be altered with the move? With the scaling of departments and teams, what has Erica seen work really well when it comes to making cross-functional teams communicate really well? What are the inflection points where Erica often see communication or process begin to breakdown? How does Erica ensure the team are still in the trenches with the clients despite the scaling? From Erica’s experience, how do the very best sales reps build relationships with their prospects? Where do many go wrong? How much time does Erica believe reps should be given when it comes to translating relationships to dollars? What is the right way to think about payback period today?    Erica’s 60 Second SaaStr: What does Erica know now that he wishes he had known at the beginning? The optimal relationship between CRO and CEO? The hardest element of being CRO @ New Relic? Read the full transcript on our blog. If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here: Jason Lemkin Harry Stebbings SaaStr

Tom Tunguz is General Partner @ Redpoint Ventures, the venture fund with a portfolio including the likes of Stripe, Netflix, Zuora, Hashicorp and Juniper Networks just to name a few. As for Tom, he joined Redpoint in 2008 and has since led investments in Kustomer, Looker, Expensify and Gremlin all prior guests on the show I hasten to add. He is also the co-author of Winning with Data: exploring the cultural changes big data brings to business. Tom has also been named on the Forbes Midas Brink list. Before joining Redpoint, Tomasz was the product manager for Google’s AdSense social-media products and AdSense internationalization. In Today’s Episode We Discuss: How Tom made his way from creating software with his father in Brazil to being GP and forefront figure in the SaaS investment community as a GP at Redpoint today? Annual contracts: To what extent do annual contracts dominate today? How does this differ when comparing enterprise to SMB? Why does Tom think in the early days one should be wary of signing too many multi-year contracts? What are the dangers there? How does Tom think about calculating churn when it comes to multi-year contracts? What were the findings on what good looks like when it comes to logo retention? How does this differ when comparing SMB to enterprise? What were the commonalities of leading indicators of churn? Is it fair to always surmise that when serving SMB one will always have a higher rate of churn? What is the right way to conduct a churn analysis? Assisted vs unassisted: What does Tom believe are the leading benchmarks for both? How does this differ when comparing SMB to enterprise? How does the impact of a salesperson change the conversion rate? What time frame from SAL to closed lead suggests product market fit? What one question must all founders be asking in the sales process? How does Tom think about constructing comp plans the right way today? How should comp plans differ when comparing AEs to customer success? Where should the responsibility for upsell lie, customer success or sales? Should sales commission be paid on renewals?   Tom’s 60 Second SaaStr: What does Tom know now that he wishes he had known at the beginning? What is Tom’s favourite book and why? What is Tom’s most recent investment and why did he say yes? Read the full transcript on our blog. If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here: Jason Lemkin Harry Stebbings SaaStr Tom Tunguz

Nick Mehta is the CEO @ Gainsight, the #1 customer success platform for corporate services, turning your customers into your best growth engine. To date Gainsight have raised over $156m from some of the world’s best VCs in the form of Lightspeed, Bessemer, Insight Venture Partners, Battery Ventures and Salesforce Ventures. As for Nick, prior to Gainsight he was the CEO @ LiveOffice where he grew cloud archiving ARR from $2m in 2008 to $25m in 2011 and drove and negotiated the acquisition by Symantec for $115m in cash. Before LiveOffice Nick was Senior Director of Product Management @ Symantec where he led $378 MM market-leading email archiving / security businesses managing over 180 people across 3 continents. I do also have to say a huge thank you to both Byron Deeter and Jason Lemkin for the intro to Nick over two years ago. In Today’s Episode We Discuss: How Nick made his way into the world of SaaS and came to lead the charge in the category creation of customer success as CEO with Gainsight? What were some of his big lessons from being CEO at 2 companies during 2 macro market crashes? What does Nick mean when he says, “customer success will fail if it is just a role and not a strategy?” What can the leader and CEO do to imbue this company wide approach to customer success? What tangible actions are on offer? What works? Where do many make mistakes? Nick has previously said, “burying customer success undel sales does not work”. Why does this have such a high rate of failure? What should the optimal sales to customer success relationship look like? What does Nick mean when he says, “product is to customer success what marketing is to sales”. How should product and customer success work together? Why does Nick believe the mythology of the “A player” when business building is fundamentally dangerous? What can leaders and CEOs proactively do to ensure a diverse and differentiated talent pipeline? What question does Nick find most revealing in terms of one’s character and potential? Where do many go wrong in building and scaling their teams in SaaS? Why does Nick push back against the “hire fast and fire fast” thesis? What are the negative consequences of it? Why is it short-sighted and premature in many cases? What does Nick suggest for individuals struggling to find their optimal role within an organisation? How much time does one give someone struggling to find their role? Nick’s 60 Second SaaStr: Who must fundamentally own the renewal, sales or customer success? What Nick know now that he wishes he had known at the beginning? What would Nick most like to change in the world of SaaS? Most surprising action that has moved the needle for a company in terms of retention? Read the full transcript on our blog. If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here: Jason Lemkin Harry Stebbings SaaStr Nick Mehta

In Today’s Episode We Discuss: David Skok: General Partner @ Matrix Partners: Why does David believe that all good products have at least one variable pricing axis? How can founders determine which variable they should choose for their product? What are the pros and cons? Chetan Puttagunta: General Partner @ Benchmark: Why does Chetan believe we have seen a strong decline in the per seat pricing model? What are the major drawbacks of it? What are we seeing replace it? What has Chetan seen work well amongst his portfolio?      Mark Suster: General Partner @ Upfront Ventures: What were Mark’s two biggest lessons on pricing from seeing the hyper-growth of Salesforce first hand? WHat does Mark advise founders when it comes to price anchoring and discounting? How does Mark view the sale of professional services with this in mind? Amanda Kleha: Chief Customer Officer @ Figma: What were Amanda’s biggest learnings from running the Zendesk pricing playbook? What does Amanda mean when she says that successful pricing is broke up into 3 separate product features?    Brad Birnbaum: Founder & CEO @ Kustomer:Why does Brad push back on the common suggestion of a “no man’s land in SaaS pricing”? Why is innovation in pricing actually detrimental to sales in most cases? Guy Podjarney, Founder & CEO @ Snyk: How does Guy think about having a large enough base to test pricing strategies? How does Guy think about the balance between freemium and paid? Does one have to come first? Read the full transcript on our blog. If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here: Jason Lemkin Harry Stebbings SaaStr

Bridget Gleason is VP of Sales @ Logz.io, the startup that uses predictive analytics and machine learning to provide monitoring, troubleshooting and security. To date, Logz have raised over $45m in funding from the likes of Openview, 83North and Vintage just to name a few. As for Bridget, she has the most incredible track record. Before Logz, Bridget was VP of Corporate Sales @ Sumo Logic where she drove ARR up by a record 237%. Prior to SumoLogic, Bridget was VP of Sales @ YesWare where she increased MRR per rep by 450%. Finally before YesWare, she was VP of Sales @ Engine Yard, where she tripled monthly recurring revenue, over course of 3+ year tenure, in 3 key leadership roles. In Today’s Episode We Discuss: How Bridget made her way into the world of sales and became the sales leader she is today, having started in the world of marketing? Having led and scaled numerous sales teams, does Bridget agree the best sales reps are outgoing and extroverted? How does the successful profile of a sales rep depend on (1) whether you are selling to SMB or enterprise? (2) The stage of the company? How can one stress test the character type of the candidate pre-hire in the interview stage?      Does Bridget believe that sales reps really are as coin operated as many suggest? Why is that potentially an unfair position to take? How does Bridget think about structuring the right comp plans for her team? What other methods of incentivisation does Bridget believe works equally as efficiently?     Does Bridget believe that you should pay sales rep commissions on services revenue? Should one pay the same or lower commissions on renewals? Should multi-year deals be paid upfront? How does one structure commissions for the sales team with that in mind?   When does Bridget believe is the right time to hire (1) your first sales reps? (2) Your first VP of Sales? Why does Bridget believe that 70% of VP of Sales positions do not work out in the first 9 months? What can founders do to increase the likelihood of success within their VP of Sales role? Where do many go wrong?   Bridget’s 60 Second SaaStr: What does Bridget know now that she wishes she had known when she started in SaaS? SDR’s are the most important function in the sales process, agree or not and why? Sales training, what works? What does not? Read the full transcript on our blog. If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here: Jason Lemkin Harry Stebbings SaaStr Bridget Gleason

Amanda Kleha is the Chief Customer Officer @ Figma, the startup that allows you to turn ideas into products faster through design, prototyping and feedback gathering, all in one place. To date, Figma have raised over $42m in VC funding from some of the best in the business including Index Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, Greylock Partners and former guests on 20VC, Daniel Gross and Adam Nash. As for Amanda, prior to Figma, she held numerous roles at Zendesk including SVP of Marketing and Sales Strategy. Amanda joined Zendesk as the first marketing hire and over the next 7 years Zendesk grew to over 2,000 employees. Before Zendesk, Amanda worked on the marketing team for Google’s Enterprise SaaS businesses. If that was not enough Amanda is also an advisor at Airtable and Smartling. In Today’s Episode We Discuss: How Amanda made her way into the world of SaaS and came to join Zendesk as their first marketing hire seeing the company scale to over 2,000 over the next 7 years? What were some of Amanda’s biggest learnings from seeing Zendesk scale from 12 to 2,000? How does one determine those that can vs cannot grow with the business? What is the sign a stretch VP is a stretch too far? How does Amanda balance between a culture of risk taking but also not accepting failure to easily?      How does Amanda like to run the interview process? Why does Amanda like to not show emotion when interviewing a candidate? What are the benefits of this for the brand of your company? What single question does Amanda find most revealing in showing the abilities and character of a candidate in an interview?    What does Amanda mean when she says “pricing is made up of 3 components”? Where does Amanda believe most people go wrong with pricing? Is there such thing as no man’s land in SaaS pricing? How does Amanda think the go-to-market has to change with every stage of development? What are the challenges with this? How does the structure of decision-making change with scale? What are the inflection points? When does both decision-making and communication tend to break down? What can be done to ensure seamless cross-functional communication across the org? Where do most people fail here?    Amanda’s 60 Second SaaStr: What does Amanda know now that she wishes she had known when she started in SaaS? Is there such thing as no man’s land in SaaS pricing? How to ensure customer support is strategic and not just reactionary? Read the full transcript on our blog. If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here: Jason Lemkin Harry Stebbings SaaStr Amanda Kleha

Anne Raimondi has more than 20 years experience driving growth at startups and building them into nationally recognized brands. She has served as a leader and executive for technology innovators including Zendesk, Survey Monkey, Blue Nile, and eBay. Anne is also a Lecturer in Management at Stanford Graduate School of Business, teaching two popular courses, “Startup Garage” and “POWer: Building the Entrepreneurial Mindset.” She currently serves on the board of directors for SendGrid (NYSE: SEND) and MyHealthTeams. If that was not enough, Anne is also an active angel investor with an incredible portfolio including the likes of Canva, ipsy, and Minted just to name a few. In Today’s Episode We Discuss: How Anne made her way into the world of startups with Zendesk? How did seeing the hyperscaling of Zendesk impact Anne’s operational approach and mindset? Does Anne agree that certain individuals are destined for certain stages of company development? What are the leading indicators that one can or cannot scale? What are the inflection points in company growth where process tend to break? What can managers do to provide security in these times of change?    Why does Anne believe that everyone should be a product person in SaaS? What are the inherent benefits of this product centricity? How does the element of product centricity change when catering to 2 customers, CIO and consumer? How does Anne advise on this issue of agency?   How does Anne approach optimising internal decision-making processes? Where do many leadership teams make mistakes here? What is the right way for leadership teams to communicate their decisions to the wider team? How does Anne approach ensuring cross-functional communication at scale? How has Anne seen her style of board membership change over the last 8 years? What has been an inflection point that has changed the way she thinks about what it takes to be a great board member? Who has been the best board member Anne has worked with? What made them so special?   Anne’s 60 Second SaaStr: What does Anne know now that she wishes she had known at the beginning? The right way for founders to view competition? What would Anne most like to change in the world of SaaS today? Read the full transcript on our blog. If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here: Jason Lemkin Harry Stebbings SaaStr Anne Raimondi

Jason VandeBoom, Founder and CEO of ActiveCampaign, shares insights on his journey from a small business to a leading SaaS platform. He strongly believes in starting with SMBs, explaining how it fosters better product feedback and team dynamics. VandeBoom discusses the right timing for hiring a VP of Sales and why funding isn’t always necessary for team scaling. He emphasizes the importance of customer engagement and maintaining a product-first mindset, debunking myths about pricing models and funding in the SaaS landscape.