One Simple Rule on When to Build a “Custom” Feature
“Custom” features … I feel this is perhaps the point founders get the worst advice of all. Especially from VCs, B2C folks, and folks that have never sold bigger deals and into the enterprise. One-off customization per se is bad. This is SaaS, not a services business. But Being paid a lot to build something […]
Dharmesh Shah of Hubspot: From Day 0 to IPO. What Went to Plan. What Most Certainly Didn’t (Video + Transcript)
In anticipation of the upcoming SaaStr Annual 2017, we’ll be releasing the full series of transcripts and videos from all the awesome 2016 sessions. There are rules in starting an enterprise software company. You will fail if you: 1) try to build a suite of products out of the gate, 2) focus solely on SMBs, or 3) […]
Small Deals at Large Companies. Hooray!! And 100% At Risk.
Every customer you close, the next day, is at risk of churn. A month-to-month customer can basically cancel anytime. An annual contract customer can sort of cancel anytime, but really probably won’t for a year, or even 3 (more on why Year 3 is the biggest risk for bigger customers here). You know this, of […]
Marketo: Winning, IPOing, and Going Upmarket (Video + Transcript)
In anticipation of the upcoming SaaStr Annual 2017, we’ll be releasing the full series of transcripts and videos from all the awesome 2016 sessions. We were super excited to have Phil Fernandez, CEO and co-founder of Marketo, sit down and talk to us about the triumphs (and struggles) leading Marketo from inception to IPO. Phil […]
It’s Cheaper In The Long Run To Pay For A Professional
I firmly believe in the truth of the old saying, “It’s cheaper in the long run to pay for a professional.” It’s an axiom that applies in nearly any situation, from decide whether or not to attempt to fix your own plumbing problems, to dealing with groupies if you’re a young All-Star. Yet while most […]
Three foolproof ways to price your startup’s product
One of the big questions entrepreneurs ask me about is how to price their product. 99% of the time, I tell them that their product is underpriced. But this begs the question, how should I price my product? The advice I tends to be very specific to the product and industry. For example, I urge […]
A Little Less About Pricing. A Little More About Deal Size. Please.
It’s not that this is rocket science. It isn’t. But if you haven’t lived it, understand that Deal Size is the single most important factor in your SaaS business model. Because it will completely define how you do sales and marketing, and to a just somewhat lesser extent, prioritize feature development and product/engineering.
Call For Pricing
One of the most fascinating, yet relatively unchartered areas of cloud computing’s all-out assault on today’s enterprise is the complex beast that is the consumption-based pricing model. Technical, operational and of course, security issues aside, it is easy to see how the advent of pay-for-what-I-use, which is commonplace in pretty much all of the leading Public […]
Organized Robbery
We’re at a time of rebellion against maintenance fees, which now include the elements of insurance, extortion, declining systems, and of course refactoring all of which add to the costs of any implementation. Add that into the actual implementation itself, and one is left with whopping fees and eventually ineffective…
Did 37Signals Increase BaseCamp Price or Not? The Backdoor Experiment.
There’s a debate going on about 37Signal’s “hidden” “unannounced” price increase of their popular Basecamp service. Apparently most of the uproar wasn’t so much due to the price hike itself, but the fact that it happened without any announcement. Cinovate Cinovate Cloud Inn. Why did 37 Signal’s Basecamp price double unannounced? http://bit.ly/bLan2a Contact Cinovate for […]
You set the price; I’ll set the terms
Bill Daniels, a cable tycoon, was a consummate deal maker. I never had the honor of meeting Bill, but his reputation in the industry has stood the test of time as have some quotes that have been attributed to him. My Partners, some of whom had the great pleasure of knowing and doing business with Bill, are […]
Windows Azure TCO Calculator
It has been just over a year since Microsoft announced about their Cloud Computing platform, Windows Azure. This year’s PDC is just around the corner and Azure is going to dominate the event. You can check out some of the sessions you can expect in this year’s event. For those who were in deep coma […]
Moving From On-Premises to SaaS, Thoughts on Revenue Corrosion
Image via CrunchBase A recurring theme for me in my writing is the pain that traditional on-premises vendors feel when considering, or actually making, a move to SaaS. Recently I posted about the success Callidus has had with this very move. Within days of that post I was contacted by Ariba software, a vendor in […]
Free Sometimes Comes at a Huge Cost
The other day I was having lunch with a bunch of technology entrepreneurs and the subject came up of the falling service levels we all experience. The conversation was particularly around the telecommunications field but could have easily been any aspect of commerce. The chap sitting next to me had a particular perception; When I […]
On Pricing, Demand and Critical Mass
Recently I received a press release from SaaS accounting vendor e-conomic (CloudAve review here) announcing the release of a new pricing structure. Their various pricing plans are dropping by a few pounds a month. Meanwhile they’ve increased the maximum transaction number to allow more companies to work within their small business plan. Commenting on the […]
