So this isn’t a sub-tweet, or sub-post. I’m not talking about any close friends in sales here. But — there are a ton of folks I know that used to be great in sales. But not anymore.

The other day someone who used to be an A+ sales leader emailed me about a position I’d introduced to him as a super hot start-up. The email to me was:

“What do they do again?”

I mean laugh if you want. But he used to be great. Maybe not epic, but really a sales leader I looked up to. Almost too smart for his own good, but great. I made intros and connections and put him on stage.

But it doesn’t matter why. He’s not that today. And you just might want to hire him.

Because his LinkedIn looks great, and he knows process. And the talk.

But he just isn’t a great seller anymore. He’s done selling, and probably, being curious. When you hire the perfect resume, make sure they still are, too. If he doesn’t even exactly know what an A+ company I introduced him to does … he’s just looking for a soft landing place.

Your startup almost certainly isn’t a soft-landing place. No matter how much you’ve raised.

The world's largest SaaS conference returns in May!!

So clearly AI is rapidly changing the way we do sales, but how will it all shake out?  Over in the contact center and post-sales space, we can already see 20%+ of customer support execs been routinely replaced by AI.

But what about the more personal sales side?

AI SDRs have taken off more quickly than AI AEs (although personally, I suspect more value will be in AI SEs and AEs that can answer my deep product and pricing questions instantly, without games).

But is it working yet, these AI SDRs?

At SaaStr Annual, Tomasz Tunguz presented the results of their survey, along with a great story of a public company CRO who had deployed AI SDRs and generated a ton of pipeline … but no closed deals. 

That was the overall result of their survey. Tons of B2B companies deploying AI SDRs already, but few deals closed so far.

We all sort of know how to fire an underperforming employee. Sort of. You let them know kindly, with care.  And move on.

But how do you fire a good >client<? One that has been paying regularly, for an extended time? That counts on you?

It happens. The reality is for service providers, you only have so many slots. Some clients are just too demanding. It’s easier to have clients that are less demanding. And sometimes if you do well, you just plain end up with too many clients. And you have to let some go.

The ones that never pay, that’s easy. The ones where you don’t do all that much for, you just wind it down.

But what about the clients that depend on you? I’ve had a few of these conversations over the years. At law firms, accounting firms, and marketing agencies where after a few years, they want a less demanding client than me and/or SaaStr.

I had an accounting firm I’d used for years not want to work with us anymore for example, when managing our taxes got a lot more complicated. And a law firm not want to work with us when we decided not to get as big as A16Z. Etc.

All I can tell you is I just don’t see agencies think about this much at all from the client’s perspective.

This edition of the SaaStr Daily is sponsored in part by ANROK

Sales tax non-compliance costs the average SaaS business 5% of revenue. Get ahead of your liability with the sales tax platform built just for SaaS.

So is a bigger booth at an event really worth it  And is a booth even worth it at all?

These are questions debated endlessly by founders and marketers … especially in the early stages. When you have just a few million in revenue, every marketing spend is stressful.

So should you go small, or go big?

The answer is probably Yes, if we look at the actual, hard SaaStr data from SaaStr Annual 2024.

The answer is you do All of It. Just more of it.

I’ve done it, I’ve lived it. It’s harder because there is no SEM or SEO volume.  It’s harder because there aren’t the same industry events.  It’s harder because there’s no big leader to directly market against.

Category creation is hard because you have to build awareness of both a new vendor AND a new category.

But … the problem you are solving isn’t new. That’s the key.

So go everywhere that problem is:

• Content Marketing About the Problem, and Real Solutions. Write about the problem and how you solve it. Write a truly awesome, canonical piece, and Google will drive you leads here over time.
• Events — Go Where Your Buyers Go. Go to the places folks who need your product are. You may not get 1,000 leads from this. But I bet you can get a few good ones.  Maybe your product is brand new, but do SaaS buyers buy it? Go to SaaStr Annual. Fintech buyers? Go to Money2020. eCommerce?  Shoptalk. Etc. etc.
• Integrations in leading platforms. Get on the marketplaces for Shopify, Salesforce, Google, etc. You won’t get a million leads overnight. But there is some discovery in every marketplace.
• Specific high-affinity / value integrations. Pick a few apps, even if they are much smaller than Shopify, where you can add insane value. Reach out to the CEO, confirm the synergy, and go build the integration.
• Targeted Outbound. Yes, outbound works. Identify 100 buyers that could really, really, really benefit from your problem. And spend an hour researching and customizing an email just for them. Yes, this will take 100+ hours. Yes, it is worth it.

So Atlassian is on a bit of a tear.

Revenue growth is up 21% overall, and subscription growth is up 33% — at almost $5 Billion in ARR. Wall Street is happy. It’s driven Atlassian stock up +28% after the results.

Is SaaS back?

Let’s dig in.

This edition of the SaaStr Daily is sponsored in part by Adyen

CFOs from SaaS platforms in the insurance and legal industries reveal how embedded payments are transforming their revenue streams

Churn much past 3% a month IMHO is not really recurring revenue anymore.

Once your customers don’t even last a full year on average, they still are customers no doubt — but they don’t recur. Not really. Not for a second year.

A lot of tools that sell to individuals and very small businesses do see churn around 5%-7% a month though.  An individual merchant might try, say an SMS tool, see that it doesn’t work for her, and cancel the following week. This is a very different buying pattern than an enterprise that might spend 3 months looking at vendors, 3 months piloting one … and then 3-10 years sticking with the one they chose.

And even SMBs, simpler products often see 3% a churn a month even if the product is great.  SMBs go out of business.  They are super strict about budget.  Then cut a lot when the business shrinks.  Unless your SMB SaaS app is truly mission-critical, truly the core OS of their SMB, churn often stubbornly stays close to 3% a month.

Should we care about AI infrastructure when building SaaS applications? The Head of the Global VC Practice at Oracle, J.D. Weinstein, and Managing Partner at Bain Capital Ventures, Aaref Hilaly, take the stage at SaaStr Annual to answer this question, plus what to expect with the future of AI.

On the last installment of Workshop Wednesday, where we bring you some of the best SaaStr speakers live with new content and to answer your questions live on Wednesdays— SaaStr CEO and Founder Jason Lemkin and Dave Kellogg, Executive in Residence at Balderton Capital share what really matters in SaaS for 2025.

• SaaStr 773: CRO Confidential: Moving Beyond Traditional Sales, Clay CEO & Co-Founder Kareem Amin on the Future of AI-Driven Growth

• SaaStr 772: What Really Matters in SaaS in 2025 with Jason Lemkin and Dave Kellogg

• SaaStr 771: The Top Marketing Strategies for 2025 Growth with the CMOs of Snowflake, LinkedIn, and Carta 

Listen on Apple Podcast, Spotify or Google Podcasts

Unless you are totally crushing it,

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Ask yourself if you would rather own 50% of a $100m company

Or 10% of a $1b company

Then you will know what you really want to build.

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