The Remarkable SaaS Podcast

This podcast interview focuses on product innovation that has the power to make B2B sales 10 times more effective. My guest is Lucas Pedretti, Co-founder and CEO of Qymatix Lucas is a self-proclaimed innovator with an MBA and 20 years’ experience in international management, business administration, and marketing of technological products. He’s worked for companies like Festo, Belden Inc. and Omron Electronics. Besides being passionate about sales, he’s an avid traveler and a Social Media aficionado. He strongly believes that “In the near future, Artificial Intelligence (AI) will be the decisive factor in medium-sized companies to remain competitive.” And that put him on a mission to make a dent in the world – and specifically the world of B2B sales by augmenting sales leaders around the world to sell more, faster And this triggered me, hence I invited Lucas to my Podcast. We explore the sizeable problem many B2B sales leaders are struggling with and how this can be resolved with technology in ways that provide exponential results. We discuss the role of AI to augment people, and not to automate them out of a job. Last but not least we discuss Lucas’ take on what traits are essential to create a remarkable software business.  Here are some of his quotes: The vision is that B2B sales is still done by people, by humans. It is still done very ineffectively, and it can be 10 to 20 times much more effective if they use new technologies. I identified the problem 20 years ago and the problem is still there. But now that technology has advanced, it has moved. My vision is to bring this technology to the people that are struggling in sales. Most of the critical sales negotiations are value driven. You still need people to communicate with each other to understand the need and the problem of each other.  They're very, very ineffective. They are mainly intuition driven, or they run from one urgency into the next one. They cannot really focus on what brings most for their company.  And as you say, it's a one to one plus three. So it's humans working with technology. The technology alone, it's only half of the solution. During this interview, you will learn three things: That we should not underestimate how long it takes to create a business out of a good idea. That you need grid – grid to stay there for a long time to build something of value. That it is critical to develop courage to quickly pull through on the things that are right for the business even if this means saying goodbye to ideas, people or key investments that at one point in time seemed the right thing. Why you shouldn’t fall in love with the product or the vision – fall in love with the problem – a problem you’re passionate about solving. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast interview focuses on product innovation that has the power to help any marketer hit the right nerve with their ideal customers by making every word resonate. My guest is Jonathan T. Mall, CEO of Neuro Flash After his studies in the Netherlands and the UK he was seduced by the opportunity to optimize consumer experience using machine learning and led the Science team in a IBM Big Data Venture. He got obsessed with understanding how people think. Because the better we understand how and what people think, the better we can understand ourselves and communicate effectively with others. This was the spark to make him found Neuro Flash, a marketing intelligence institute, using Big Data and Neuromarketing to understand, predict and influence how people react to persuasive content. And this inspired me, hence I invited Jonathan to my podcast. We explore the big problem in the market to make meaningful connections with those we aim to serve. We also discuss how technology can be used to not only create short-term impact, but more importantly help companies build the foundation for the long-run. Last but not least we discuss what it takes to be remarkable at what you do as a business software company. Here are some of his quotes: We use machines to predict what people think about words, sentences or images. And well, with that, with that power, you can obviously communicate extremely effectively because we can ensure that every word, every sentence, every image is expressing exactly what you want to express to sell your product, to motivate yourself, to tell you stories for anything regarding marketing. So, we don't need to ask people anymore about what they think.  We can all use the machines to predict what people think. That's really the opportunity. During this interview, you will learn three things: What value we can unlock when we focus on technology to democratize highly scarce experts – enabling any companies of any size to compete with the biggest brands out there.  That being successful in marketing is not about how many people you reach, but how many people you make believe Why it’s important to have the courage to not do things See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You are about to listen to a very special edition of my podcast – edition #100. And what a moment to have this coincide with the launch of my new book ‘The Remarkable Effect.’   I wrote this book specifically for you - tech-entrepreneurs-on-a-mission, and the leaders in your marketing, product and sales team that help you in shaping the software business you’ve always aspired to run: Remarkable and Impactful.   For me, remarkable is more than just a word. It’s a vision. It’s the art to create meaningful impact to prospects and customers. Impact that’s worth making a remark about. Something they would miss is it was gone. Being remarkable is something that I believe every company can achieve.   In this special episode, I share the back-story of my book and the stories that inspired it. I’ll reveal the ten traits I’ve identified that define a remarkable software company. I will also explain how, by stacking those traits behind each other, it will not only help you stand out in your category but also create clear leverage of value, exponential value, not just incremental – hence ‘The Remarkable Effect.’   Enjoy!       See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast interview focuses on the technology advancements of the last decade and in particular how enterprise software vendors can capture a bigger opportunity. My guest is Vinnie Mirchandani  Vinnie is the founder of Deal Architect - a Technology strategy and negotiation firm listed as a leading "boutique" by the Black Book of Outsourcing. Vinnie also founded IQ4hire, a projects marketplace and Jetstream Group, a sourcing advisory firm. Earlier in his career he had various technology consulting roles at PwC (now IBM) in the US, Europe and Asia, and worked as an industry analyst at Gartner.  He wrote various books about the evolution and future of the enterprise software, amongst which Silicon Collar, The New Polymath, The New Technology Elite and SAP Nation 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0. Other than he’s an inspiring blogger – and exactly that triggered me to invite him again to my podcast. We explore his blog ‘A Decade-end review: Enterprise Applications have NOT eaten the world’ and dig deeper on the question: what can we learn from the past decade and how should we use that knowledge to capitalize on it in the next decade.  Here are some of his quotes: It's kind of fascinating to look at the 10 years how much optimism there was around SaaS, in the beginning of the decade, how SaaS has done and where things have not improved. If you go back to Marc Andreessen, he wrote a column for the Wall Street Journal earlier in the decade where he said, we have enough technology we have enough you know, we have enough where software can transform industries, software. He basically said software is going to eat the world. Over and over again, what I saw was, many new markets emerged or grew or transformed. But the software vendors either completely missed it, or they were at the edge of it and didn't really do much. To get into other categories you have to keep evolving. You can't just expect your licenses and subscriptions to keep helping you grow. If you define a market too narrowly, then you start looking at your competition very narrowly. And you miss the big markets around it. During this interview, you will learn four things: Revisit the concept of Addressable markets – is it really what you think it is, or is it actually holding you back from thinking bigger? Don’t only hire technology visionaries – start hiring functional visionaries as well. It’s the tension between the two that will help you break new grounds The biggest opportunities in the next few years will be in verticals - operational areas - and in geographic expansion. After 20 years of cloud applications, it is amazing how many industries and countries have so little choice Stop looking at just your immediate competition. The biggest risks, but also the biggest growth, come out from left field.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast interview focuses on product innovation that has the power to help Not for Profits raise more donations and achieve their cause faster. My guest is David Semerad, CEO of Kindest. David is a driven entrepreneur with more than a decade of experience in the software development field. He holds a bachelor’s degree in economics and a master’s degree in information technology from the Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague. He also studied at Technische Universitat Munchen in Germany and Universidad de Malaga in Spain and is a member of the Forbes Agency Council as well as the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC). In 2004 he co-founded STRV, a one-stop mobile app and web development shop working with top-tier startups and brands.  In addition to STRV has spun off several companies. The Game, acquired by Spark Networks in 2014, followed by Surge, the world’s 3rd largest gay social network (3M+ users) and one of the world’s fastest food delivery startups Ordr. David’s work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Wired and TechCrunch. What triggered me to invite David to my podcast was his most recent startup Kindest. Kindest and here is why: Just as nonprofits rely on the generosity of their donors, Kindest business model relies on optional tips. It’s what allows Kindest to remain completely free for all nonprofits that need them.  In our podcast interview we explore the underserved market for small and medium sized Not for Profits and how the basic needs of donors – transparency - are even today still not met. We also discuss Kindest business model, and how exactly that business model gives them the ultimate incentive to do exactly the right thing for their ideal customer. And this pays off. Here are some of his quotes: There is a huge opportunity to bring something extremely, intuitive, simple and effective in the hands of nonprofits, because right now all the tools available there are focused on large nonprofit organizations that have big teams in house.  But actually, the fun fact is that there is 1.5 million nonprofits in the US, and 92% of them are actually small to medium size. And no one is focused on those 92% of nonprofits They don't have a marketing expert in house. They don't have an engineer in house and there is no tools available for them.  So we decided to jump into the space. We basically build a solution that is extremely easy, effective, and also free to help all their fundraising and donor management needs.  Whereas we don't charge any monthly or annual fees. We don't take any cut on donations and everything is just directly going to nonprofit. During this interview, you will learn three things: That creating a cool-looking app doesn’t always mean it will take off. If people are not waking up in the middle of the night around the idea of your solution, it likely doesn’t solve a valuable and urgent problem. That momentum starts when you’ve created a solution that gives your users their focus back and allows them to do what they are good at.  Why its key to avoid conflict of interest by aligning your mission and your business model. If the two are optimally aligned it will create your flywheel. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast interview focuses on product innovation to provide both individuals and brands their unique vocal personality – so they can be heard. My guest is Rupal Patel, Founder and CEO of VocalID INC Rupal is an internationally renowned speech scientist. She was named a Voice Visionary in 2019 by Voicebot and listed amongst the 50 most creative in business by FastCompany, Rupal is a sought-after public speaker on the future of voice AI. Her work has been featured on TED, NPR, BBC, Wall Street Journal, and more. She holds two patents, a degree in Psychology from the University of Calgary, a Masters and Ph.D. in Speech-Language Pathology from the University of Toronto, with post-doctoral studies in speech acoustics at MIT. VocaliD, a voice AI company that creates unique synthetic voices. VocalID was founded on the believe that every individual should have a unique voice, regardless of their vocal ability. This triggered me, hence I invited Rupal to my podcast. We explore the wealth of opportunity of voice technology – not only for those that have lost their ability to speak, but also to give a voice to brands and to the all products we use on a day to day basis.  Here are some of her quotes: We believe that vocal identity is such an important part of someone's personality of how they think of themselves, whether that's an individual or whether that is a company or an organization. The voice is really metaphorically and sometimes figuratively part of their identity. Our social mission behind what we do at vocal ID is to give voice to those who are underheard or not heard, because they have some kind of a speech disability. Voice is so connected to individuality, that if everything sounded the same, it also means that they all have the same value proposition, or they all have the same kind of roots.  The ultimate kind of application is not where we become dependent on the technology but that the technology really facilitates interaction between humans.  What I mean by that is if the technology is really helping us connect to individuals in ways that are meaningful, then it's done its job. During this interview, you will learn three things: Why voice is still so underutilized as a mechanism to connect and interact with the users of our products How voice can help take adoption of your product to new levels by its ability to create a unique bond with users, build trust and change behavior. That you role as a product owner is not to reinvent everything – sometimes you are way better of using readily available components and understand their value proposition in context of what you are trying to achieve. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast interview focuses on product innovation that has the power to revolutionize the way markers communicate with their audience. My guest is Joe Urban, Co-founder of Vennli Joe is a core marketing faculty member in Notre Dame’s MBA program and past Associate Dean of the Mendoza College of Business with numerous publication credits related to customer decision making and growth strategy. In 2010, Joe Urbany co-wrote a book entitled ‘Grow by Focusing on What Matters: Competitive Strategy in 3-circles.’ The premise of the book is that growth and competitive advantage are about effective positioning. The model facilitates speed of understanding and action by focusing strategic attention on what impacts customer decisions.  It has been applied in over 1500 projects in the Graduate Business Masters Programs at Notre Dame and it’s the model that led to founding Vennli in 2013. Vennli brings the model to life through the use of collaborative technology and by providing a platform that delivers customer choice analytics and makes an already intuitive process even more accelerated and streamlined. Being a marketer by heart, this triggered me, and hence invited Joe to my podcast.  We explore why marketers experience so many issues in increasing the performance of their content. We address why it’s not the lack of technology that sits in the way, but the approach we take to creating the content. And that’s a relatively easy thing to fix.  Here are some of his quotes:  … many, if not most, companies make decisions about strategy and tactics that don't fully account for the views and the perceptions of the people who determine their success, and that is: Customers. We tend to operate on the basis of past knowledge and our best intuition about what it is the customers value. What we found over and over, and really this came out of my executive MBA teaching in a big way: There were significant gaps between what businesspeople were thinking or predicted and then what customers actually said. And when you close those gaps and make decisions that better align with customers, the impact can be enormous No one is immune from this … we get enamored with our inventions. Often the coolest inventions today are technical in nature. It's much more difficult to translate a technology into a validated product that really solves a problem for somebody. During this interview, you will learn three things: Why starting with the big idea and a crystal value proposition is not only going to help marketing perform better, but everyone and everything else in your organization – simply from the power of alignment How rethinking who’s our real competitor is not only going to increase urgency and improve win-rates, but also fine-tune the value of our product investment What value we can unlock when our solutions provide new insights – and AHA moments. And how this could rewire how an organization thinks and acts. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast interview focuses on product innovation to build high-performing teams and bring out the very best in people. My guest is Stephen Lowisz.   Stephen M. Lowisz is a Fortune 500 consultant, serial entrepreneur, keynote speaker and coach who generated his first $1 million in revenue at 19. As the Director of Performance Solutions at Qualigence, he uses his expertise to grow and scale technology companies around the globe. Qualigence combines the people analytics technology with consulting to optimize talent at leading organizations. The aim: build high-performing team. He’s an official member of the Forbes Business Development and Sales council. I got intrigued by the approach Qualigence takes to talent optimization and scaling – hence I invited Stephen to my podcast. We explore what’s broken in the process of hiring people, why there’s an 80% chance of getting it wrong, and what needs to change in order to get it right, while optimizing the performance of the workforce you already have..  Here are some of his quotes: At Qualigence as a whole, historically was a talent acquisition consulting shop. We've been hiring and helping people build out their teams for 20 years. Now what?  How do we reduce churn? How do we get the best out of the people that we're bringing on board? How do we optimize the team and make sure everyone is performing to the best of their ability, just like we expect from our technology? So the main problem is, think about when you buy Salesforce. You're going to optimize it until it's perfect for your business objectives, You're going to customize the hell out of it.  You're going to have a whole lot of fun doing so. But when we go hire people, we put I'm on the shelf and we do nothing. During this interview, you will learn three things: Why technology should not be focused on getting the most out of people, but instead getting the best out of them. How we can create exponential impact by combining the three T’s: Tactics, Talent and Technology Why CEO’s need a mindset change around what drives growth. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast interview focuses on driving product innovation by applying the concepts of Radical Product Thinking and my guest is Radhika Dutt, Co-founder of the Radical Product Thinking movement Radhika is a product development executive and entrepreneur. She participated in 4 exits, 2 of which were companies she founded. She’s a global citizen having lived or worked on 4 continents - speaks 9 languages and has an engineering background from MIT.  She is the author of the Radical Product blog which is also the name of her movement of leaders creating vision-driven change.  Radical Product Thinking is a systematic approach for cultivating change-makers in our organizations and building world-changing products. And this triggered me, hence I invited Radhika to my podcast. We explore some of the common mistakes made in product management and software development and discuss how Radical Product Thinking can be the recipe for any software company to become remarkable at what they do, and thereby deliver an impact never held possible before. Here are some of her quotes: When I was building my own startups, I made many mistakes. And I learned from these mistakes. I also worked at companies where they were making similar mistakes. Rarely, there were companies that weren't making these mistakes. We have come to believe that the way you build products is just to iteration: try something, try something else. And that's really how you build products. And what was driving me was, it doesn't have to be that way. Because what happens is you keep pivoting, and you lose momentum along the way. So, it doesn't have to be that way. Or can we build products that are successful more systematically. And that's how radical product came into being. Radical product thinking means that you can think of anything as your product, that your product is really a mechanism to create change. And so, whatever change you're trying to bring about in the world, you can build a product that is engineering that change. During this interview, you will learn three things: That iteration is a very good concept in software development, as long as you know what your north star is. Why product market fit is not the holy grale. The big question is if that product market fit is creating the change you intended to create. If not – question your vision How focusing your solution on someone rather than everyone is going to give you the focus to deliver real impact See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast interview focuses on the essence of the book “The AI Republic: Building the Nexus Between Humans and Intelligent Automation. My guest is one of the authors, Mark Esposito. He is a Co-founder of Nexus FrontierTech, a leading global firm providing AI solutions to a variety of clients across industries, sectors, and regions. In 2016 he was listed on the Radar of Thinkers50, as one of the 30 most prominent business thinkers on the rise, globally. Mark has worked as Professor of Business & Economics at Hult International Business School and at Thunderbird Global School of Management at Arizona State University and as Fellow at the Judge Business School in the UK, as part of the Circular Economy Center. He has developed and conducted courses in Business, Government & Society & Economic Strategy and Competitiveness for Harvard University's Division of Continuing Education. Mark also served as Institutes Council Co-Leader at the Microeconomics of Competitiveness program (MOC) at the Institute of Strategy and Competitiveness, at Harvard Business School under the mentorship of Professor Michael E. Porter. I interviewed Mark for the first time in episode 22 of my podcast. We then focused on his best-selling book ‘Understanding How the Future Unfolds’. Today we discuss his new book ‘The AI Republic’ and explore the changes that are required to build a position of advantage by blending humans and tech in a relevant way. Here are some of his quotes: There is a whole degree of misinformation about AI out there. Especially from a business perspective of b2b, where we're trying to make clients.  Regardless of how educated they were, I think they were heavily influenced by what they were hearing. The more you work with AI scientists the least they call it intelligence. They call it everything but AI. I said: ‘why is there's such a big gap between what the scientists who develop this technology talk about and what everybody else describes?’  And so, the AI Republic is really the effort to create this relationship between what we think that technology is and can do, which is by itself is a phenomenal advance in our technologies, and the misinformation that I think we're currently have so that we can empower more and more people, first of all to know, and once they know, they can make a deliberate decision whether they need it or whether they actually they just need some good form of either automation or digital transformation. During this interview, you will learn three things: That to succeed with AI we have to get the entire organization engaged – not only IT. Understand i needs to be part of the core strategy and that it’s a collaborative long-term process, not a one-off thing. Why the question is never ‘how do humans compare with machines?’, but instead ‘How do I integrate technology in jobs that currently exist or can exist?’ and ‘How do I empower this to become a form of excellence’  That getting started is a lot about recognizing where your business model is generating a friction with where the market is going – and from there determining where technology can help you. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices