In my talk at the 2017 SaaStr Annual conference, the goal was to offer a simple model of a SaaS business and highlight key areas for optimization within the SaaS funnel. Watch the video presentation to learn the key levers a CEO can pull to make the greatest impact to their business.
(video from SaaStr Annual 2017)
To get an idea for what I talk about in the video above, you can take a look through the accompanying slide deck presentation here:
During my talk, I only had time to touch on each key lever at a high level. For more learnings, I wanted to share a list of resources that will help you dig deeper into each of the key levers within the SaaS funnel:
Product/market fit
- Setting the Startup Accelerator Pedal: Three phases of a startup lifecycle and how the role of the CEO shifts, requiring a different focus and approach at each phase:
Top of the funnel flow
- SaaS Metrics 2.0 – A Guide to Measuring and Improving What Matters: A comprehensive look the foundation of key metrics needed to understand and optimize a SaaS business.
Conversion rates
- Customer Acquisition: Maximizing your Funnel: Optimize the customer acquisition funnel by getting inside customers’ heads to analyze and remove blockage points.
- Growth Hacking: Creating a Wow! Moment: Create a Wow! moment to help customers truly understand and experience the value of your product.
CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost)
- How Sales Complexity Impacts Your Startup’s Viability: Understanding sales cycle complexity and the impact it has on customer acquisition cost (CAC).
- Startup Killer: The Cost of Customer Acquisition: How to avoid one of the biggest causes of startup failure by understanding the true cost of acquiring customers.
Number of salespeople
- Recruiting: The Third Crucial Startup Skill: Building the strongest recruiting funnel possible to find and hire the best talent.
- A Shockingly Common Way that Sales Misses Plan: How a good sales hiring plan can help you get ahead of the curve and achieve sales targets.
PPR (Productivity Per Rep)
- Sales Development Metrics and Compensation Report: A set of benchmarks providing insight into sales organization structure, ramp, productivity, quota, tenure and more.
Getting enough leads
- Inside Sales Best Practices: HubSpot – A Case Study: Hiring, onboarding and how to engineer the relationship between sales and marketing to drive the number of deals closed.
Pricing
- Scalable Pricing: A Key Tool for SaaS Success: A breakdown of scalable pricing and how it provides a powerful tool to grow revenue in a SaaS business.
Customer retention rate, Dollar retention rate, Months to recover CAC
- Key Drivers for SaaS Success: A comprehensive look at the metrics you must understand to optimize a SaaS business.
Recruiting, onboarding & management
- A Strong Team Starts at Onboarding: Having a high performing team means not only hiring the right people, but creating the structure, culture, knowledge and skills to enable them to do great work.
