The SaaS Revolution Show

Dave Grow always considered himself an operator. When he joined Lucidchart seven years ago, shortly after co-founders Karl Sun and Ben Dilts had built the product, he was there to take care of the business side of things. From answering customer support tickets and doing digital marketing to hiring and setting up partnerships, Dave did it all. Currently the company's COO and President, back then he did not dare put a C-level title in front of his name. “I was always convinced that someone more experienced will come down the line who will take it over,” he says. As COO and President, Dave has seen the transformation Lucidchart underwent, from offering freemium plans to single users all the way to signing up Enterprise customers such as Box, Dropbox, Accenture, and Groupon. Listen on to hear: How the pricing plans have evolved to reach 10 million users What are the different GTM strategies to get to that sort of scale and what has worked for Lucidchart? Should SaaS companies nowadays have a Freemium model? How Lucidchart moved upmarket and how they overcame the challenges they faced How to find the intersection between what you love and what brings value to your company P.S. One curious fact that Dave only touches upon is that Lucidchart has not used a cent of the $40 million in funding they raised to fuel that growth. It’s one of many topics he will get into detail at his SaaStock18 talk. Joining him will be many other founders and operators we have signed up as speakers such as Michael Litt, founder of Viddyard, David Cancel, founder of Drift and Meagen Eisenberg, CMO of MongoDB. Join our Insider Sale https://insider.saastock.com by April 1st to get a 2 for 1 ticket discount code.    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)

On this week’s episode, we take you back to one of the panels we hosted on the SaaStock17 stage. Benedicte de Raphelis Soissan, founder of Clustree, Phil Chambers, CEO and co-founder of Peakon, and Jonathan Anguelov, co-founder and COO of Aircall discus the power of people, and how to hire, keep and develop people for the success of the company. Benedicte shares how she has grown Clustree to 25 people in the past three years, carefully crafting a hiring plan and an idea who is a right fit. Phil eludes to the importance of alignment, which Peakon has aimed to get from the first moment and has scaled to 70 people spread between three offices. Jonathan shares how Aircall has developed an outcome based onboarding process, where every employee has a bespoke and detailed plan, making sure that they get quickly on track with everything they need to know and be able to execute. Listen on to hear: What are the recruiting processes of three of the most exciting European SaaS companies How to onboard people so they feel part of the organisation and can quickly deliver How to transcend company culture through geographical boundaries How to create the company values and get a buy in from people When is the right time to establish remote teams P.S. Bringing such diverse viewpoints on key SaaS topics is one of many ways SaaStock helps to grow your company. We already have signed up over 50 exciting speakers for SaaStock18 such as Michael Litt, founder of Viddyard, David Cancel, founder of Drift and David Skok, Managing Partner, Matrix Partners. Join our Insider Sale by March 31st https://insider.saastock.com to get a 2 for1 discount code on April 1st. This is not an April fools joke. 2 tickets for the price of 1. By entering the Insider Sale, you also get the chance to win great prizes like platinum tickets, team tickets, and cool SaaStock swag.    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)

Kyle Poyar is a self-professed pricing and growth nerd. The latest guest on the SaaS Revolution Show, Kyle is Senior Director of Market Strategy at Openview, one of many speakers we will welcome in Dublin for SaaStock18. His passion lays in seeing how packaging and pricing have the power to build large and enduring business. Kyle helps OpenView’s portfolio companies accelerate to top-line growth through deep insights into their market landscape and customers. Kyle recently published an article studying the price changes Netflix introduced https://labs.openviewpartners.com/netflix-pricing-strategy/#.Wnx15pOFjOQ. The point he was making there, as he does so on the podcast as well, is that few companies understand the true effect price increases have on a company’s bottom line, a contributing factor to the reluctance of many SaaS founders to charge more. Kyle is also the author of a comprehensive pricing e-book - Mastering SaaS Pricing. http://offers.openviewpartners.com/mastering-saas-pricing Listen on to learn How to be more data-driven in your pricing decisions How to have better pricing conversations with customers What are the signs it’s time for a price increase What are the impacts of increasing prices and why no one should be scared of that How do you implement and communicate a price increase P.S. Boston where Kyle comes from, like many other cities around the world, has become a hotspot for SaaS. In the next year, we will visit some of them, bringing SaaStock on Tour, starting with London on March 21st where we’ll gather 300 SaaS founders, their executive teams, and local VCs. In an epic day of content, learning, and networking, we will host amazing speakers such as Peter Bauer, who to this date is the only UK headquartered SaaS to IPO with Mimecast, Peter Holten Muhlmann, CEO of one of Europe’s greatest scaleups, Trustpilot, and Des Traynor Co-founder of Intercom. To see full agenda and grab yourself a ticket head over to SaaStock.com/ontour/city/london. For a special 20% discount for podcast listeners use code saasrevolution. https://ti.to/saastock/SOT-London/discount/saasrevolution    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)

Few people grow up deciding sales will be their career. Matthew Bellows, CEO of Yesware, is no exception. The latest guest on the Saas Revolution Show, he is something of an accidental salesman. It never was the plan but as soon as Matthew began working he figured that was where he could be of best use to a business. Through the years he got into more managerial roles and eventually became a VP of Sales. After a few years on the job, however, he got fired from it. It was the last straw. For years he had experienced challenges doing his job. It was time he addressed them. Nothing had felt as painful as presenting the quarterly forecast to the board. It had been impossible to gather all the information from the reps to have any certainty in his numbers. Software could help, Matthew was convinced. In 2011 Yesware was born. Seven years later, Yesware currently has over 60,000 paying customers and $20 million in ARR and to date has raised $38 million in VC funding. In this candid interview Matthew shares many valuable insights. From why appearance to employees is a CEO's most important role, which requires personal care such as one-hour meditation every day in Matthew’s case, to much more specific topics such as: Why Yesware killed freemium and what was the impact on customers What are the go-to-market strategies that work for them now Why companies should look for internal rather than external metrics for word of mouth Why there never is an endpoint to the SaaS journey and what to do about it as a CEO Why no one really knows what they are doing and that’s okay. If you like the episode, please leave a review. P.S. We are bringing SaaStock on Tour. First up is London on March 21st. Spend the day in the company of 300 SaaS founders, their executive teams and local VCs and see Des Traynor Co-founder and CSO of Intercom, Ryan Singer, Head of Strategy at Basecamp, Peter Holten Mulhmann CEO of Trustpilot, Philippe Botteri Partner at Accel and Laurence Bret Stern, CRO at Pipedrive to name a few. https://www.saastock.com/ontour/city/london    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)

Bridget Harris, CEO and co-founder of youcanbook.me, had initially assumed she would be raising money for the online scheduling tool she was building with her co-founder. Bridget and Keith Harris spoke to many investors, looked at many term sheets and soon began grasping a peculiar fact - running a company with VC funding doesn’t make things easier, if anything, it may make them more difficult. The latest guest on the SaaS Revolution Show, Bridget has been bootstrapping youcanbook.me for the past six years. While the bootstrapped route is not for the faint-hearted, it allowed them to grow as fast as they wanted, even if that required expert knowledge of the difference between cash flow and actual income The company now employs 13 people and recently reached $2 million in ARR and is well on track to get to $3 million by the end of the year. Listen on to learn: How you learn to determine which expense makes sense and which doesn’t What made Bridget well suited for the bootstrapped path How to know when to take a risk and when not to How to make the finances work in a bootstrapped company and still grow What is a defining characteristic of a great entrepreneur P.S. We are bringing SaaStock on Tour. First up is London on March 21st. Spend the day in the company of 300 SaaS founders, their executive teams and local VCs and see Des Traynor Co-founder and CSO of Intercom, Ryan Singer, Head of Strategy at Basecamp, Peter Holten Mulhmann CEO of Trustpilot, Philippe Botteri Partner at Accel and Laurence Bret Stern, CRO at Pipedrive to name a few. https://www.saastock.com/ontour/city/london    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)

Paddle's traction and growth is the stuff of dreams. A company helping software creators sell since 2012, it has been recognised by Deloitte as the fastest growing software company in the UK. With hundreds of customers and a recent $12.5 million Series B round, the company has remained under the radar most of this time. How does that happen? On this episode, Christian Owens, Paddle's CEO gives a very clear explanation. In the heart of the growth are the sincere customer relationships that Christian and his co-founder Harrison have been building and maintaining since day 1. The two co-founders fostered genuine friendships with their first hundred customers by trying to deeply understand their challenges and building Paddle together. Christian and Harrison approached these people as human beings they admired rather than businesses they sold to. Their belief was, if Paddle was the right tool to address their challenges, they could become customers one day. Listen on to learn: How Paddle approached people initially and got their first customers How they built sincere relationships and maintained them Why they never advertise their referral program How to make product decisions with both customers and strategy in mind What Christian has learned as a Thiel fellow P.S. Christian is one of 129 incredible speakers we have lined up for SaaStock18. If you are based in London, hop over to the Meetup https://splashthat.com/sites/view/saastockmeetup-leaseweb.splashthat.com we are hosting together with Leaseweb on September 27th where Christian will share even more details on how to scale worthy of a Deloitte first place.    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)

Fred Shilmover, CEO of InsightSquared, shares how he has grown the company the past 7 years by staying laser-focused and not expanding globally. It has been there since day -1, back when Fred applied for an MBA to figure out what SaaS company he wanted to create. Fred did a proper research what would be of most value to people. Eventually, he figured that to deliver the best value to customers and not have a bloated product, the focus should be only on revenue. A lucky early sale to a cohort of similar companies showed a pattern that what they were onto made sense. Fred created a prototype putting together loads of spreadsheets and gave that to his co-founders to build a product. In the first year, he made all the sales. Somewhere there Fred made the decision that sales efforts would be focused solely on The North American market. With that geographical focus, InsightSquared now has close to 1000 customers, has banked $27 million in funding and employs 130 people. In that, he is a prime example that to grow, SaaS founders have to do less. Listen to learn how he has kept his focus on: Why a CEO should do a tour of duty for all main functions How to avoid building the wrong product at the start What is the cost of defocusing How to manage your appetite when you are hungry for many things How the strategy of a company should change through its different stages If you like the episode, please leave us a review.    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)

As is often the case in tech, timing is crucial. It’s hitting the sweet spot of offering a solution when a market is just ready but not overflowing with competitors. Hanno Renner, CEO and co-founder of German HR solution Personio, and the latest guest on the SaaS Revolution Show got his timing just right. He launched the company two and a half years ago in Munich at a time when the HR industry in Europe was ripe for digitization. In fact, it was so ripe in the small and medium businesses segment that to this day Hanno hasn’t had to do a cold call to sell his product. 30% of prospects still come from organic referrals. However, there is more to scaling and success than timing and luck. In Personio’s case, the hardest thing has been growing the organisation that supports the somewhat easier product adoption. Listen on to hear: How to interview candidates for fit How to avoid making hiring decisions out of necessity What guiding principles to use when setting an organisation Why you should seek the advice of business angels How to rely more on your gut feeling when you hire If you like the episode, please leave us a review.    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)

Peter Holten Mühlmann, CEO of Trustpilot, an online review community, talks with Alex Theuma on the latest episode of the SaaS Revolution Show and offers practical wisdom such as when is the right time to go international, how to fundraise and what is the question every CEO needs to be answering as a company scales. Trustpilot’s story began ten years ago in Copenhagen when Peter decided all companies with online presence deserved to show they have happy customers through reviews and ratings. Peter initially had a very naive idea how he was going to build an Internet company and what his business model would be. Get on the front page of every paper in Denmark, become viral and make money from AdWords. After this business model earned €4 to the company, Peter figured he had to find a better way. Hundreds of cold calls and asks for people to review every site they had ever used later, Trustpilot began to gather momentum. Approaching unicorn status today, the company operates from 7 offices around the world, but Copenhagen is still the main HQ. Trustpilot has grown to over 600 people. The reviews that companies showcase are seen 2 billion times each month. In the interview, Peter talks at length that the key to scaling successfully is maintaining personal balance throughout the journey and relentlessly answering the pivotal question Why we exist as a company to everyone around. Listen to learn: How to fundraise as a European company How to know when to go international How to outsource scaling to all your employees How to remain sane on the journey of scaling a SaaS company If you like the episode, please leave us a review.    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)

On the latest episode of the SaaS Revolution Show Alex is joined by Chris Hall, CEO at Dutch marketing tech company Bynder. In the conversation they touch on the pillars that define the journey of a CEO - from scaling and growing the company, its culture and its people to the personal transformation a CEO undergoes and how to deal with it. One key lesson he has picked on the way is that the most satisfying thing about being a CEO is seeing every person succeed in the right role. Founded in 2013, Bynder was a spin-off from Label A, a web development agency Chris ran with his co-founders Roland Keijzer and Stefan Pelders. The company bootstrapped its way to $10 million ARR in the following three years. “When you are bootstrapped, your only problem is cash,” Chris says. “Every purchase you make feels like it’s coming from your pocket.” To seize the potential Bynder had for growth, it needed the sort of cash injection that comes with VC funding. By August 2016, Bynder secured a $20 million Series A round. Chris had to very quickly transition from the entrepreneur that fixed everything to the CEO that would let go and allow others to do it. Listen on to hear: How to stop micromanaging people. How to tackle the challenges of being the CEO of a venture-backed scaling company. How to balance the act between listening to your own gut and what blogs and podcasts are telling you to do. How to get and keep the right people at the different stages of a company growth. How to create an authentic and genuine culture and live up to the words you put out as CEO. Please let us know how we are doing by leaving a review on your favourite podcast application.    Check out the other ways SaaStock is helping SaaS founders move their business forward: 🇮🇪 SaaStock Europe | Dublin, IrelandBook tickets: https://saastock-europe.com/🇺🇸 SaaStock USA | Austin, TexasBook tickets: https://saastock-usa.com/🤝 SaaStock Founder Membership: A private members group of B2B SaaS founders between $100K - $10M ARR who are committed to growth and helping others (https://www.saastock.com/founder-membership/)🌎 SaaStock Local: Monthly meet-ups in cities all around the world, bringing together SaaS enthusiasts and experts to discuss the most pressing topics in SaaS (https://local.saastock.com/home)