So there are Cloud and SaaS companies growing quickly. And then there are just a handful growing like SentinelOne.
At almost $500m in ARR, it’s still growing a stunning … 106% (!). Wow.
Yes, cybersecurity remains hot, even in these more challenging times. And for the very best? Red hot. The buyers are still there in droves.
$100k+ customers are the key to hypergrowth. SentinelOne’s customer count is up 55% overall to 9,250, but $100k+ customers are up 99%. A story we see again and again of gradually going upmarket and doing bigger and bigger deals. But they didn’t rush there overnight.
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Attaining unicorn status can be incredibly difficult. While many startups aspire toward unicorn status, only a few achieve it. Unicorn companies often need to scale quickly to meet the demands of their rapidly growing customer base. But it requires a lot of resources and infrastructure to support the growth.
To achieve this level of success, startups need a combination of strong financial performance, innovative products or services, and a favorable market environment. Drift co-founders David Cancel and Elias Torres share their insights on steering a company to a $1 billion valuation.
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It's here! The full agenda has just launched for SaaStr APAC 2023!
Get ready for 50+ speakers for the very first SaaStr APAC event in Singapore, including:
- APAC Update: State of the Cloud with Bessemer Venture Partners, Anant Vidur Puri, Partner at Bessemer Venture Partners
- Lessons Learned in Scaling to $1B ARR: From VMware, AWS and Databricks with Databrick's SVP and GM Ed Lenta
- The Secrets to Building a Global Platform and Ecosystem with Xero's Global Chief Strategy Officer, Damien Tampling
- The Playbook to Building Cross-Border SaaS Teams: Challenges and Best Practices with Vymo, Multiplier, WATI and Sequoia with Bianca Ho, Co-Founder & COO @ WATI, Yamini Bhat, Co-founder & CEO @ Vymo, Sagar Khatri, Co-Founder and CEO @ Multiplier, Abheek Anand, Managing Director @ Sequoia SEA
- Top 5 Trends of APAC's Unicorns: Deep Insights from 100+ SaaS (and Cloud) Startups with Stripe's Head of Product Valerie Wagoner
And many, many more!
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“Thanks for the discussion, but we’ve have 4 years more on our contract with your competitor. Talk to you in a few years.”
— email forwarded from SaaStr community CEO a little ways back
Once you’ve been selling for even a little while, you’ll start to assemble a list of the common “objections” to buying your app.
These so-called objections will bother you, not because they are wrong per se — but because they are coming from leads. Truly qualified leads and prospects. Especially, in-bound leads. I mean — why did the prospect even bother to in-bound if they aren’t interested in buying?
It’s the most common objection you’ll get in SaaS sales …
Not Right Now. I Don’t Have Budget. It’s Great, But Not This Quarter.
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To overgeneralize, but to give you a pretty rough sense:
Sales cycles are very much impacted by the intent of the prospect.
Intent varies from High Probability / Intent Opportunities (“I Need to Buy Now” — this exploded during the pandemic) to Very Low Intent and Probability, and this is important to factor in, especially during the earlier days when you’re not as strong as lead scoring and lead management.
It may take one call to close a High Probability Opp. It may take you 2 years in some cases in the early days.
Once you have a bit of an engine going though these are good benchmarks.
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So anecdotally, it seems to me sales productivity startups are one of the biggest impacted by the current macro environment. It seems like everyone just … stopped buying them.
But is that an excuse to sort of quiet quit? To give up a bit?
I say No.
In fact, I always say No. I sold a sales tool in 2008-2009 when the global economy was in total meltdown, and I’ll tell you, we sure didn’t stop selling. You shouldn’t, either. But for sure you have to sell smarter, to the segments of your customer base still doing well, often to far more stakeholders, and new ones, and with more proof of ROI.
With that, we did a survey to see who is actually still hiring in sales.
And the answer? Most of you. 62% of you.
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It’s a question being asked more often these days, unfortunately. And the answer?
It’s OK — up to a point:
- So long as the founders did everything they possibly could to make it work. Truly everything; and
- The total loss is relatively small compared to (1) that partner’s total portfolio and (2) the total fund size.
There are two types of losses for VCs and professional investors: losses than fit into your “expected loss rate” and profile … and unexpected, and often, abnormally high losses.
The first is OK. The second can in some cases be Game Over.
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For the 7th year in a row, we’re expanding our Equality, Inclusion and Balance program.
We are proud that the 2022 SaaStr Annual featured a combined 60% women and multicultural speakers and have had over 60% women and multicultural speakers at each SaaStr Annual since 2018, and we hope to do even better in 2023!
Our core goals and values at SaaStr include:
- Putting on the most inclusive events in the industry and
- Being as inclusive a community as possible.
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This edition of the SaaStr Daily is sponsored in part by Brex
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Brex is reimagining corporate cards and spend management to help founders get fast access to 10-20 times higher credit limits, unlimited virtual cards, a no-fee business account, and built-in software.
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