The Official SaaStr Podcast: SaaS | Founders

Latest Episodes:

SaaStr 067: Gusto's Joshua Reeves on How To Optimise The Hiring & Interview Process, How To Build Create An Ownership Culture & Why Every 6 Months A Company Becomes A New Company Oct 21, 2016

Show notes

Josh Reeves is the Founder and CEO @ Gusto. Gusto reimagines payroll, benefits, HR, and personal finance and it is this reimagination that has led to their recent addition to the unicorn club with investors including Google Capital, Kleiner Perkins, Data Collective and General Catalyst, just to name a few. As for Josh, he was selected for the 2012 Forbes 30 Under 30 list. Prior to co-founding Gusto, he was the CEO and co-founder of Unwrap, a SaaS startup which was acquired in 2010, and he began his career as an early employee at Zazzle. I would also like to give a big hand to Jason Lemkin and Phil Libin for the intro to Josh today.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

HR and Payroll is not sexy so how did Josh make his way into the industry and what was the a-ha moment for Gusto?
Josh has said before 'he lives and breathes how a company is built.' How has Josh looked to grow and develop his own internal organisation at Gusto? How does this vary with stage?
Josh has hired over 300 people at Gusto, how does he approach the interview process? What is the right way for employers to approach the 'making offers' stage?
How important does Josh feel it is to have an ownership culture and internal entrepreneurialism? How can this environment be fostered and developed?

60 Second SaaStr

How employers can ensure new employees have an amazing first day?
What does Josh know now that he wishes he had known when he started?
The biggest mistake SaaS companies make with their HR and payroll organisation?

If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here:

SaaStr 066: Why CEO's Should Lead From The Heart, Walk The Sales Floor, Pay The Sales Team Well & Why Sometimes, You Have To Go Slow To Go Fast with Jeff Fernandez, Founder & CEO @ Grovo Oct 17, 2016

Show notes

Jeff Fernandez is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Grovo, the enterprise learning solution that allows you to educate and empower your employees. At Grovo, Jeff oversees sales, investor relations, and the building of Grovo's award-winning culture. Prior to founding Grovo in 2010, Jeff served as product manager at Clickable (acquired by Syncapse). From 2006 until 2009, he led business development and sales for Doostang (acquired by Universum Global), an online career networking community. Jeff is also a bit of a rockstar off the field getting the highest honours from Harvard penning his thesis on human performance and then playing semi pro football for the New York Rebels in 2008. I would also like to say a massive thank you to Greg Sands @ Costanoa Venture Capital for the intro to Jeff today.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How Jeff came to found Grovo? What was the a-ha moment for him?
Jeff is renowned to 'lead from the heart'. What are the advantages of this as a CEO? How does this affect the company, the culture? What are the inherent challenges?
Question from Greg Sands: Jeff likes to 'work the sales floor', how does that work? What does Jeff actually do? What have been Jeff's observations having seen the sales floor up close?
How does Jeff look to structure the compensation for his sales team? How does this vary with time and stage?
What does Jeff mean when he says 'sometimes you have to go slow to go fast'? How does that play out in his management style?

60 Second SaaStr

Jeff's biggest productivity tips?
Biggest challenge for Jeff in being CEO @ Grovo?
What does Jeff know now that he wishes he had known at the beginning?

If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here:

SaaStr 065: How To Create An Ownership Culture, When To Hire Your First Customer Success Rep and Why The Funnel Needs To Be Re-Invented with Sangram Vajre, Founder & CMO @ Terminus Oct 14, 2016

Show notes

Sangram Vajre is the Co-Founder & CMO at Terminus, the leading account-based marketing platform. Prior to Terminus, Sangram was the Head of Marketing @ Pardo, prior to it's acquisition by Salesforce. Sangram is also the brains behind the marvel that is Flip My Funnel which challenges the status quo of traditional B2B marketing practices and transform how B2B marketers approached driving revenue in their organization. You might remember in a recent episode Tim Kopp @ Hyde Park Ventures cited Sangram and his revolutionary approach with Flip My Funnel as one to watch. If that was not enough, Sangram is also the author of "Account-Based Marketing For Dummies".

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How Sangram came to found Flip My Funnel and Terminus? What was the a-ha moment and origin story for Sangram?
Why does Sangram believe the funnel needs to be reinvented? Where are the inefficiencies? What can be done to optimise the funnel and what are the steps to do so?
How did Sangram establish such a strong brand in the B2B space on a shoe-string budget in such a short space of time? What tactics can be done to exert your authority over a domain?
How does Sangram look to create an ownership culture of internal entrepreneurs at Terminus? Why is it so important to try and hire people who know more than you?
Why did Sangram decide to hire a customer success rep before any other function? What did he look for in his first CS person? What does Sangram thinks is fundamental to being successful at CS?

60 Second SaaStr

Biggest learning from founding and scaling Terminus?
Sangram's Favourite SaaS reading material?

If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here:

SaaStr 064: Why Now Is A Really Good Time For SaaS Startups To Raise, How SaaS Startups Can Innovate Their Business Models & The Biggest Takeaways From Working With John Doerr @ Kleiner Perkins with Matt Murphy, Managing Director @ Menlo Ventures Oct 10, 2016

Show notes

Matt Murphy is a Managing Director @ Menlo Ventures where he focuses on multi-stage investments across cloud infrastructure and AI-first SaaS applications. Since joining Menlo, Matt has led investments in Heap Analytics, Usermind, and Veriflow. Previously, Matt was a General Partner at Kleiner Perkins for over 15 years. Matt was also an observer at Google (from initial investment to IPO), launched the iFund in '08 (a collaborative initiative with Apple to build the defining applications on the iOS platform), and led KPCB's investments in AutoNavi (Nasdaq: AMAP, 2010) and Aerohive Networks (Nasdaq: HIVE, 2014). Before joining KPCB, Matt worked at semiconductor startup Netboost (acquired by Intel) and prior to that at Sun Microsystems.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How Matt made his way into the world of VC and enterprise investing? What were his biggest takeaways from working alongside John Doerr @ Kleiner Perkins?
How is the enterprise investing landscape changing? What fundamental shifts have we seen and what have been the dominant repercussions of this?
Nakul Mandan stated that 'we would see the 2nd wave of consumerisation of enterprise through business model'. Does Matt agree with this and what key trends is Matt most excited about in SaaS?
How does Matt look to evaluate early stage SaaS valuations? What are people fundamentally misvaluing and how should the topic be approached?
Is it harder now for SaaS companies to raise than ever before? What metrics does Matt look for in a Series A investment opportunity?

60 Second SaaStr

Matt's Fave SaaS reading material?
What are the greenfield opportunities in SaaS today?
What was Matt's biggest takeaway from working with John Doerr @ Kleiner Perkins?

If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here:

SaaStr 063: The Sales Script That Increases Conversion By 80%, How To Optimise Events Increasing Leads & Demos & How Bootstrapped Startups Can Scale Teams Alongside Revenue with Brandon Bruce, Founder & COO @ Cirrus Insight Oct 07, 2016

Show notes

Brandon Bruce is the Co-Founder and COO @ Cirrus Insight, the plugin for Gmail and Outlook that automatically updates Salesforce as you work. Cirrus is a bootstrapped startup with triple-digit yearly growth since it's founding 4 years ago and has grown from 2 co-founders in 2011 to a team of 55 people today. And I have to say a huge thanks to Aaron Ross, Author @ Predictable Revenue for the intro to Brandon today. Likewise, if you want to join me and Jason for mojitos at SaaStr Annual 2017 and also want an incredible 20% off ticket prices, then all you have to do is click here!

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How did Brandon make his way into the world of SaaS and come to found Cirrus Insight?
What does Brandon mean he says he likes to take the road less travelled in Sales? What have been his learnings from his interactions on the front line of sales? How has it changed how he approaches sales?
How are Cirrus so efficient at events in terms of getting more leads, meeting and sales? What is the strategy going into events? How can we optimise this?
Speaking of events in general there, how does Brandon look to define prospect and buyer personas? How important is this for events? How narrow and specific do these personas have to be?
Brandon has stated before in the importance of learning and doing manual before automatic with the future in mind. What do he mean by this and how does it affect his roadmap and thought process to the future going forward?

60 Second SaaStr

Favourite SaaS reading material?
What does Brandon know now that he wish he had known at the beginning?
The biggest challenge of running Cirrus and how Brandon looks to combat it?

If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here:

SaaStr 062: Why Unprofitable Customers Must Be Fired, Segmentation in Sales Breeds Laziness & The Future of Sales in an AI Driven World with John Barrows, Godfather of Sales Oct 03, 2016

Show notes

John Barrows is essentially the Godfather of Sales. We often have VPs of Sales from tech titans on the show but who trains those VPs and sales reps to be the best in the world at sales? That is where John Barrows comes in, with clients including Dropbox, Box, Marketo, Twilio and many more, John has amassed a wealth of knowledge and experience allowing him to provide the most proactive sales tips and strategies to optimise the sales process. If you have not checked out his blog, that really is a must and can be found here.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How did John make his way into the world of SaaS and more specifically sales optimisation?
How has John seen the sales landscape evolve? What has been the effect of the segmentation of roles pioneered by Salesforce?
What will be the catalyst that causes teams to shift from current sales methods and teams to AI replacing the sales team? What does this depend on?
How does John view the integration of sales and marketing? How does the rise of ABM change this?
How can sales reps perfect the balance of being direct and being rude? How important is a summary email? What is the optimal structure and how should sales reps follow up on summary emails?

60 Second SaaStr

The most common question asked to John by VPs of Sales?
What are the benefits of Top Down prospecting?
Do execs need structure?

If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here:

SaaStr 061: The Optimal Relationship Between Customer Success & Sales, Why CS Is Not A Playbook Function & Why The Best CSMs Are Like Good Parents with John Gleeson, VP Customer Success @ Affinio Sep 30, 2016

Show notes

John Gleeson is VP of Customer Success @ Affinio where John was employee #1. 2 years and a half years later, John is the VP of Customer Success following their Series A and has seen the team expand to over 40 people and have offices in New York, Toronto, Halifax and Ireland. John has written a special blog post just for SaaStr listeners today outlining his ultimate guide to customer success reading, it is my go to guide for customer success.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How did John make his way into the world of SaaS and more specifically customer success?
John has previously described customer success as 'The Analogue of Sales', what does he mean by this? How does it affect the way he views customer success
How does John view the role of sales vs customer success in large accounts? How do they partner to drive expansion?
How customer success managers be truly productive at the enterprise level? How can they measure their success with this productivity increase?
Moving downstream, why does John believe the $2m benchmark per CSM is the hardest phase? What skills do you need to be successful at this stage? With so many accounts, is it possible to be proactive?

60 Second SaaStr

The biggest mistake most companies make when it comes to customer success?
Most common questions asked by CSM leaders?
Measuring customer success?

If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here:

SaaStr 060: How To Use SDR As A Growth Engine a & Customer Success As A Bridge For Gaps In Product with Lawrence Coburn, Founder & CEO @ DoubleDutch Sep 26, 2016

Show notes

Lawrence Coburn is the Founder & CEO @ DoubleDutch, the category leader for event marketing automation. If you are at SaaStr and have the pleasure of using the SaaStr app, yep that is DoubleDutch! They have raised more than $75m in VC funding from some of the best VCs in the world including Index Ventures, Bessemer, Floodgate and Bullpen. As for Lawrence he is a three time entrepreneur, Lawrence also founded RateItAll, a top ten consumer review property, and LocationMeme, a blog about location based services. Lawrence is also the geo-location editor for The Next Web, is a mentor at IO Ventures, a San Francisco based incubator, and on the advisory board for the Enterprise 2.0 conference.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How did Lawrence made his way into SaaS and then came to found DoubleDutch, the category leader for mobile social events?
How does Lawrence look to use SDR as a growth engine and does he think it is important to invest in this early to build the machine?
How has Lawrence found the transition in terms of moving upmarket from SMB to Enterprise? How does Lawrence look to differentiate himself in such a crowded market?
How has Lawrence seen the evolution of the team? Does he agree there are different people for different phases of the growth cycle?
How does Lawrence look to use customer success as a bridge to cover gaps in product?

60 Second SaaStr

Fave SaaS resource?
What does Lawrence know now that he wish he had known at the beginning?
What is the biggest challenge Lawrence faces to this day?

If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here:

SaaStr 059: How To Measure Sales Team Success, Test New Pricing, Build Culture From Day 1 & The Biggest Learnings From Watching Box Scale Into Hypergrowth with Michael Cardamone, Managing Director @ Acceleprise Sep 23, 2016

Show notes

Michael Cardamone is the Managing Director of Acceleprise, a SaaS focused accelerator based in San Francisco and backed by leading operators. He is also an advisor to and angel investor in early stage SaaS companies. Prior to Acceleprise, Michael was one of the first 30 employees at Box in a business development role and then led partnerships at an EdTech company called AcademixDirect.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How did Michael make his way into the world of SaaS and then start Acceleprise in SF?
How can founders know when is the right time to ship product? Does Michael agree with Reid Hoffman, 'if you are not embarrassed by your V1, it is too late'? How should startups look to establish a pricing mechanism at such an early stage?
What are Mike's thoughts on freemium? Before Mike has said founders can charge more than they think. Why does he think this and how can founders know when they have reached their price ceiling?
Do founders need to sell their own product? How should founders approach the sales learning process? What questions should they be asking
How important is it for a startup to have an ideal customer profile? Should founders be looking for influential customers early or just getting as many dollars in as possible? How impactful can big brands and companies be as customers to early stage companies?

60 Second SaaStr

Scrappiness: good or not as it just simply isn't scalable?
Most common challenge for Mike's companies?
Fave SaaS reading material?
Entrepreneur optimism: Let it run or be wary?

If you would like to find out more about the show and the guests presented, you can follow us on Twitter here:

SaaStr 058: Intercom's Eoghan McCabe on Why There Are No Rules For Building a SaaS Company, How To Turn Every Challenge Into An Opportunity & Why You Will Never Have As Much Empathy For Others As You Do For Yourself Sep 19, 2016

Show notes

Eoghan McCabe is CEO and co-founder of Intercom. The customer communications platform that has taken the saas world by storm in the last few years with 116m in VC funding from truly some of the world's best including Bessemer, Social Capital and Index Ventures. He previously founded Contrast, an award-winning software design consultancy, and co-founded Exceptional, a developer tool startup acquired in 2011 and now a part of Rackspace.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How did Intercom break out in the early days with seemingly lots of competition and an install before you buy process?
In terms of category creation, in the early days how did Eoghan convince people of a product that had previously never existed? At what stage did Eoghan and Des stop selling the product themselves? When is the right time to hire your VP of Sales?
How did Eoghan establish a pricing mechanism for Intercom? Why is Eoghan such an advocate for value based pricing?
Why it is so important for founders and sales teams to have empathy for the customer? How can you practice empathy? How can you cheat empathy?
How does Eoghan manage a distributed workforce so well? What does he do to create links and culture between both the Dublin and SF office?

60 Second SaaStr