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The Official SaaStr Podcast: SaaS | Founders | Investors

The Official SaaStr Podcast is the latest and greatest from the world of SaaStr, interviewing the most prominent operators and investors to discover their tips, tactics and strategies to attain success in the fiercely competitive world of SaaS. On the side of the operators, we center around getting from $0 to $100m ARR faster, what it takes to scale successfully and what are the core elements of hiring. As for the investors, we learn what metrics they hone in on when examining SaaS business, what type of metrics excites them and what they look for in SaaS founders.
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The Official SaaStr Podcast: SaaS | Founders | Investors
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Now displaying: February, 2018
Feb 26, 2018

Mark Godley is the President of LeadGenius, the startup that provides the power of human intelligence with the scale of machine learning. To date they have raised $16m in funding from the likes of a16z, Initialized Capital, Scott and Cyan Banister and SV angel just to name a few. As for Mark, he most recently served as Chief Revenue Officer for HG Data and before that was VP of Market Development for ConnectandSell. If that was not enough, mark also holds advisory roles in the salestech and martech space, including Omniquo, ZenIQ.io and The Big Willow.

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

  • How Mark made his way into the world of SaaS over 25 years ago? How has he seen the industry change so remarkably over that time?
  • Why does Mark believe that many startups today are created with the wrong intentions? Who is ultimately to blame for this, the founders or the investors who back them? Why does Mark believe that SaaS founders should “ignore fundraising and sign customers”? What are the unidentified consequences to Mark of taking external money?
  • How does Mark view the function played by discounting in onboarding your first few key customers? What does Mark think of pilots? How willing should founders be to engage with unpaid pilots?
  • How can enterprise founders solve the 2 big problems today of. A.) Standing out in the sea of enterprise startups? Gain trust from enterprise CIOs when they are still a small team with little brand or track record?
  • What does Mark believe is the secret to selling to enterprise effectively? Why must founders be both credible and vulnerable when selling? What is the difference between helping someone buy and selling them a product?

60 Second SaaStr

  1. What does Mark know now that he wishes he had known at the beginning?
  2. Why are data vendors their own worst enemy?
  3. What would Mark like to change about the world of VC and startups?

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

Mark Godley

If you have a digital product, whether it’s mobile or web, Amplitude’s product analytics helps you understand what your users are doing, iterate and ship product faster, and drive metrics like engagement and retention. To learn how you can use analytics to build a sticky product that grows your business, get your free copy of the Product Analytics Playbook from Amplitude. This 155-page book (with worksheets) will help you develop a comprehensive retention strategy for your product — just click here to download.

 

User education is one of the most powerful ways to increase engagement and retention at scale, yet is often put in the too hard basket. Elevio is the platform that removes this burden, empowering your users to self-serve contextually relevant help via their support widget and embeddable elements, increasing retention and engagement, while reducing support load. Elevio even tells you what content to add or fix and why based on usage trends from your users. Preventing content rot, and increasing coverage, which we all know is an ongoing challenge. You can also integrate with your existing support stack for content, access to live-chat, support tickets and more. Use elevio for continuous user education with 20% off your first year at (elev dot I O / saastr) using coupon code GOHARRY

Feb 19, 2018

Wade Foster is the Founder & CEO @ Zapier, the startup that moves information between your web apps automatically, so you can focus on your most important work. A couple of incredible achievements from Zapier, they have scaled to a phenomenal $35m in ARR, they have built a time of over 130 people, all without a central office and they have done this with just $1.2m in early stage funding from the likes of Bessemer, Y Combinator and DFJ.  

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

  • How Wade made his way into the world of SaaS and came to found Zapier?
  • Why does Wade believe that founders need to put in place traditional management sooner than they normally do? What should this structure look like? When is the optimal time to start considering it and then implementing it?
  • Wade has said before that most startups should “ignore fundraising”, why does he believe this? How has bootstrapping Zapier influenced how he manages and scales the company? What lessons has he taken from VC backed founders that he has applied to the growth of Zapier?
  • Zapier is a completely remote team, what is the secret to seamless communication and company culture when building a team to 130 with no central office? What are the core benefits? What are the fundamental challenges?

60 Second SaaStr

  1. What does Wade know now that he wishes he had known at the beginning?
  2. Why should everyone on the team do support?
  3. How does Wade look to scale himself as CEO?

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

Wade Foster

If you have a digital product, whether it’s mobile or web, Amplitude’s product analytics helps you understand what your users are doing, iterate and ship product faster, and drive metrics like engagement and retention. To learn how you can use analytics to build a sticky product that grows your business, get your free copy of the Product Analytics Playbook from Amplitude. This 155-page book (with worksheets) will help you develop a comprehensive retention strategy for your product — just click here to download.

 

User education is one of the most powerful ways to increase engagement and retention at scale, yet is often put in the too hard basket. Elevio is the platform that removes this burden, empowering your users to self-serve contextually relevant help via their support widget and embeddable elements, increasing retention and engagement, while reducing support load. Elevio even tells you what content to add or fix and why based on usage trends from your users. Preventing content rot, and increasing coverage, which we all know is an ongoing challenge. You can also integrate with your existing support stack for content, access to live-chat, support tickets and more. Use elevio for continuous user education with 20% off your first year at (elev dot I O / saastr) using coupon code GOHARRY

Feb 12, 2018

Olof Mathé is the Founder & CEO @ Mixmax, the startup that allows you to be a sales pro, providing powerful analytics, automation and enhancements for your outbound communication and a product that has achieved almost the impossible in SaaS, true viral growth and a $0 CAC. As for Olof, prior to Mixmax he led the team that built Inkling Habitat, now adopted by the world’s largest publishers and before that he was an entrepreneur and worked at Skype and McKinsey.

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

  • How Olof made his way to the bay and how he made his way into the world of SaaS with the founding of Mixmax?
  • Why does Olof believe that customer success is the new marketing? What does this mean for the right time to hire your first customer success rep? What are the other subsequent advantages of instilling an early customer success team?
  • Why does Olof believe that every company must have some haters? What does this suggest about your product? How should startup founders react to this? Is there a method of damage limitation with these segments Why does Olof think it is ok if they come from your core user base?
  • With regards to growth, how important does Olof view the differing forms of metrics? How many should founders be focussed on? How does this approach affect your internal decision-making? How does it affect product roadmap?
  • How does Olof break down the structure of Mixmax into 3 subsequent parts? Why does Olof not like employees in SF working from home? What are the drawbacks to this? What is the right way to recruit remote employees? Why is not all inbound poor quality?

60 Second SaaStr

  1. What does Olof know now that he wishes he had known at the beginning?
  2. How to cost effectively deal with inbound hiring applications?
  3. What is the least discussed but most worthy topic in SaaS?

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

Olof Mathé

If you have a digital product, whether it’s mobile or web, Amplitude’s product analytics helps you understand what your users are doing, iterate and ship product faster, and drive metrics like engagement and retention. To learn how you can use analytics to build a sticky product that grows your business, get your free copy of the Product Analytics Playbook from Amplitude. This 155-page book (with worksheets) will help you develop a comprehensive retention strategy for your product — just click here to download.

User education is one of the most powerful ways to increase engagement and retention at scale, yet is often put in the too hard basket. Elevio is the platform that removes this burden, empowering your users to self-serve contextually relevant help via their support widget and embeddable elements, increasing retention and engagement, while reducing support load. Elevio even tells you what content to add or fix and why based on usage trends from your users. Preventing content rot, and increasing coverage, which we all know is an ongoing challenge. You can also integrate with your existing support stack for content, access to live-chat, support tickets and more. Use elevio for continuous user education with 20% off your first year at (elev dot I O / saastr) using coupon code GOHARRY

 

Feb 5, 2018

Brad Feld is one of the world’s leading VCs having Co-Founded Foundry Group, Brad has made investments in the likes of Zynga, Makerbot and Fitbit, just to name a few. Brad is also Co-Founder of Techstars, one of the world’s most prominent startup accelerators, whose portfolio companies have raised over $1.3bn in funding. If that wasn’t enough Brad is also a best selling author having co-authoured Venture Deals: Be Smarter Than Your Lawyer and VC and Startup Communities: Building An Entrepreneurial Ecosystem In Your Community.

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

  • How Brad made his way into the world of VC and came to found Foundry Group?
  • Brad has previously stated that companies can be segmented into 3 different core components? What does he mean by this? How can startups be structured internally for scalability?
  • Why does Brad hate the word culture? How should culture be viewed and approach internally within startups?
  • How has Brad seen his personal development with regards to being a board member? What has he got better at? What does he believe makes a great board member?
  • Why is CAC the easiest metric to game in SaaS? How should the CAC/LTV ratio be approached? How can entrepreneurs use this to attract VC investment?

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

Brad Feld

If you have a digital product, whether it’s mobile or web, Amplitude’s product analytics helps you understand what your users are doing, iterate and ship product faster, and drive metrics like engagement and retention. To learn how you can use analytics to build a sticky product that grows your business, get your free copy of the Product Analytics Playbook from Amplitude. This 155-page book (with worksheets) will help you develop a comprehensive retention strategy for your product — just click here to download.

 

User education is one of the most powerful ways to increase engagement and retention at scale, yet is often put in the too hard basket. Elevio is the platform that removes this burden, empowering your users to self-serve contextually relevant help via their support widget and embeddable elements, increasing retention and engagement, while reducing support load. Elevio even tells you what content to add or fix and why based on usage trends from your users. Preventing content rot, and increasing coverage, which we all know is an ongoing challenge. You can also integrate with your existing support stack for content, access to live-chat, support tickets and more. Use elevio for continuous user education with 20% off your first year at (elev dot I O / saastr) using coupon code GOHARRY

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