Don Erwin, Head of Revenue @ Mixmax
Podcast: SaaStr Episode #280 Don Erwin sits with Jason Lemkin and lays out the playbook he used to shift Mixmax from a self serve product to an upselling and outbound…
Why Your Cost of Sales Generally Doubles As You Scale
One of the biggest things first-time founders intuit wrong is how much sales efficiency plummets … just as it is getting good. Usually, most SaaS start-ups follow a pattern where the CEO starts off doing founder-led sales. Then, after she hires a few sales reps, and makes a few mistakes.
What You Want to Hit: 50+20 at 10 (million in ARR)
The first SaaStr post that got widespread distribution was this one — “Want to Understand SaaS? If Nothing Else — Understand That It Compounds.”
It means it’s really, really hard to get revenues going. You close a customer for $120 in annualized revenue, you only get to recognize $10 of that a month. A lot of work for ten bucks.
The Easiest Ways to Get From $1M ARR to $10M ARR
The most important thing is not to chase the shiny penny, assuming you are growing at least 60% Year-over-Year. You’ve done the Impossible. You’ve gotten 50, 100, whatever # of businesses to pay you $1,000,000 a year. There are 10,000 new apps out there. It’s “impossible” to get to $1m.
Blog: SaaStr
The SaaStr Blog is hosted by Jason Lemkin with contributions from thought leaders, founders, and VC’s. Amazing resource with a never-ending stream of easy to digest content, easily my favorite source for SaaS content.
Maybe It’s Time For Marketing to Make a Real Revenue Commit
So a while back on SaaStr, we did a couple of posts about how B2B and SaaS marketing needed to catch up. That you needed your VP of Marketing to make a real lead commit, to have a true quota of some form. Not just get you blue pens with your logo on it.
A Basic Structure for a VP, Sales Comp Plan: 50/50/25+
One key post I missed on the VP Sales journey was how to pay this critical role. I don’t think it’s necessarily as nuanced and interesting a topic as how to pay and scale the sales team itself, or how to hire for this role.
An Initial Sales Rep Comp Plan to Lower Your Stress Level, Increase Cash, and Make Everyone a Lot of Money
I’m not ashamed to admit that when I set up our first SaaS sales comp plan, I had no idea what I was doing. In my first start-up, yes I sold to the enterprise. I sold $6m our first year (man, that sounds good looking back on it).