Since March, what are some trends or changes you have seen in the SaaS sales ecosystem?

There was an initial panic in March that led to layoffs across the board and budget freezes even for high ROI products and much-needed investments. Starting in June we have seen the market bounce back. Customers are still very thoughtful about where they spend money and don’t want to take big risks, but they are no longer in panic mode and are starting to think about important investments that allow their business to grow. For startups that don’t have proven brands and products, the implication is that they need to be more open to pilots and shorter-term contracts, and they really need to prove ROI.

For your team, what changes have you had to make in your growth strategy since Q1 in order to stay on target with your goals?

We used to have one really aggressive growth plan, but given the uncertainty in the market, we have adopted a baseline, worst-case and best-case scenario. We carefully monitor leading indicators such as lead volume and deal conversion rates to make sure we don’t get ahead of our skis with hiring.

We looked at Q2 as a bit of a lost quarter for rapid growth and instead really focused on product development and customer happiness. Fortunately, we were always very lean so we didn’t have to do layoffs and continued to make “essential” hires, but we cut down operating expenses wherever possible. Now that we are seeing signals of the market bouncing back, we are switching gears to focus on growth in Q3 while still being thoughtful about cost management.

In this more constrained economic environment, how are you thinking about paid vs organic channels? What’s changed since Q1?

As a startup, paid marketing is a very small portion of our customer acquisition. We only spend money on remarketing and targeted ABM ads. Even for larger companies, we saw a contraction in paid advertising and a 20-30% drop in search volumes. I definitely think companies are looking for high ROI investments including getting more efficient in converting their prospects. This is a good change because tech companies were getting really fast and loose with buying traffic and not thinking much about how to convert that traffic. A good growth engine requires equal investment in generating traffic/awareness and converting that traffic through better messaging and more relevant personalized experiences for different buyer segments. I have been preaching this for a while, and it’s nice to see the market organically moving in that direction.

With so much uncertainty in the B2B market over the past few months due to reduced or stagnant marketing and sales budgets, what advice do you have for early-stage B2B startups aiming to meet their growth goals in Q3?

I just trained the latest batch of founders in Y Combinator and my advice to them was the same. Buyers become more risk averse during recessions, which means startups have to be more open to pilots and hand-on ways to quickly prove ROI to the customer. I am always surprised by early-stage companies that assume the customer is going to do all the work to make the business case and make the product successful -- you have to roll up your sleeves and help the customer get value out of your product. For instance, for our first customers at Mutiny, I created an entire personalization strategy and wrote their website content. Every time we heard “no” or saw slow adoption, I would ask if I could help them do the work. I would go onsite and sit with their team to observe every blocker to adoption, and then come back to our team to brainstorm how we could improve the product. We have now productized much of those manual steps, but without getting in the weeds with our customers, we would have never uncovered the blockers.

It’s also important to find ways to add credibility whether it’s leveraging your network or press or customer references.

Is there anything you think founders should be thinking about right now or anything you want to add?

I think it can be disheartening to experience a sudden recession where sales and fundraising are suddenly much harder. But I also think this is a great opportunity for founders to focus on building truly valuable products and low friction sales motions. In a bull market, many companies reach series A, B, and even C without true product-market fit. Eventually, that catches up with you and is much harder to fix or pivot when you have a ton of existing customer inertia and a large team. The current market gives startups the opportunity to get it right at the early stage when they are much more nimble. If you stay lean and focus on your customers, NPS and churn, you will end up with a much better product and company in the long run.

This is also a great opportunity for all of us to build community, learn from each other and adapt. I have always been a big believer in community, but I can’t stress how impactful it has been in the past few months to stay connected to other founders and operators tackling similar problems and learn from each other’s creativity.