The Saas Revolution Show

A company is essentially two things: a group of people and a collection of decisions. How those people make these decisions is the art of running a business (37signals). We make decisions every single day, it’s what often dictates the direction of a business. Some decisions work out and some don’t. Some are quick to make and some tough to call. You’ll never be able to consider every single piece of data, analysis or consequence when making a decision - sometimes a decision has to be made from the gut. Legendary founder, Jason Fried is joined by SaaStock’s CEO, Alex Theuma, to share his decision making philosophy and answer some of the biggest questions founders face today.Check out the other ways SaaStock is serving SaaS founders

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Aytekin Tank, CEO of Jotform, as he shares how he bootstrapped a unicorn SaaS with teams of no more than six people. "One interesting number I can give is, like, we always had this 50% revenue growth rate and we still have that. That's very interesting. Actually, if we didn't develop the enterprise version, we would actually lose that - we would probably drop down to like 30%. But then the enterprise came to help, and we still have that 50% growth rate today." Aytekin shares: - The one thing he did pre-Jotform that meant he had a much smoother ride in becoming an entrepreneur - Why he's a big believer of free products, and how that goodwill leads to paying customers - How being a company of small cross functional teams has kept a positive company culture - The makeup of each team and how they cultivate innovation, productivity, and creativity - The building blocks of success, where technical skills meet business skills and more!

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined live at SaaStock USA 2024 by Kyle Hanslovan, co-founder & CEO at Huntress. "That nuance of finding the green field, the niche, is probably the single biggest differentiator that will help you escape and go, you know, you can sell to finds at one million or make five million in revenue, but to escape ten you have to have a process and you have to have a real market that is differentiated and that niche will get you there if you can just really ask yourself 'am I differentiated' and again, I didn't respect that." Kyle shares: - The journey to $1M and then $10M ARR - His process of finding and engaging channel partners - His biggest challenge over the next year, and how he plans to solve it - The reality of 'hire slow, fire fast', incl. open communication and employee churn - When work life balance meets sacrifice - is it one you're truly willing to make? and more!Check out the other ways SaaStock is serving SaaS founders

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Jake Dunlap, CEO of Skaled, who shares the innovations in sales required to hit your goals. "Relevancy cuts through the noise. That is the only way to be successful - that is it, it is singular. If your team and your organisation cannot send relevant messages, whether it's via video, whether it's via LinkedIn, voice-note, whether it's email or call, you will not generate meetings. So that's where the human comes in." Jake shares: - The most important thing that CEOs should be doing *right now* - The core component of hitting outbound targets - Modern sales processes and the vecs concept: vetted, educated, cold and self service - Relevancy vs personalisation, and the *only* way to win - Meeting the modern customer where they stand- 40% of buyers would like the option to self service buy at 2030, where do sales reps fit in? and more!Check out the other ways SaaStock is serving SaaS founders

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Adam Robinson, founder & CEO of Retention.com, who shares his lessons from when a bootstrapper tries to grow like a venture backed company. "The word bootstrap mostly describes 'okay, I got it to 3 million, it's making a million and a half bucks. I don't have a lot of employees, I don't have a lot of problems, this is great'. The problem is like, most of those companies are actually just slowly dying. But what creating companies like that can allow you to do is you get it to that; you get somebody else running it, and then you try to tinker around and like, make another one. By the time you're like, 'oh, this is working, I'm actually going to focus on it', It ends up being bigger than the last one." Adam shares: - His 10 year stint working "The Big Short" - Equating entrepreneurship with being able to be present - Hustle meets reality: why five years went by before he paid himself a dollar - Churn dynamic and financial discip

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by David Klein, Co-founder and Managing Partner at One Peak, who shares his insights on how the SaaS and investing market is changing. "1% increase in growth, the impact on valuation is the same as a 3% increase in profitability- even today. So growth is just valued at three times profitability, even today. And that number was about 12x in November 2021, so at the height of the bull market. So growth is, in our mind, still really important, and if you want to build a big business, you just have to grow. " David shares: - From resigning on the same day to where One Peak is today; $300M, $500M, and $1B funds - What lies ahead for the European and American markets - The shift from focusing on growth to profitability (and which is more important...) - The the return of the series a and the series b, an uptick in consolidations, and shifting goalposts - Bridge rounds - are they a necessary evil? and more!Check out the other ways SaaStock

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Ev Kontsevoy, CEO of Teleport, as he shares how to decide which baby to kill... "We never make obviously bad decisions. Every single decision seems rational in the moment. But there is like a certain trend - and the one thing that keeps biting me is ignoring complexity for too long. Eventually I self correct, and I just realised 'hey, the business is getting more complicated, the product is getting more complicated, the way we sell is getting more complicated.' And every time I kind of catch myself, like, I should have thought about this six months ago, now it's too complicated. So letting complexity creep in is just awful. Just don't do that." Ev shares: - Mailgun.com and the beginning of the cloud revolution - Creating a bubble for yourself: diving into internal and external motivators - Coding in a cave: building pieces of software that replace an entire part of an organisation - The year of two growing products - Evaluating t

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Wes Bush, founder & CEO of ProductLed, who shares his thoughts on product led scale. "PLG is going to become the de facto go to market motion that powers SaaS companies of the future, whether you like it or not, it's just everything's going that way. And so with that said, what I want to kind of emphasize is product led growth isn't the be all end all when it comes to actually building a product led business - it's actually just half of the story." Wes shares: - How they've helped their customers generate over a billion dollars of product led revenue - AI's impact on PLG - His most controversial PLG opinion  - How to turn what you do best into generating new business - Ying & Yang: Why product led growth and being a product led organisation need to go hand in hand - Why challenging your boss can be key to team alignment - A sneak peek into his #SaaStockUSA session, including the nine core components that every founder nee

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Martha Bitar, CEO at Flodesk, who shares the top 5 things that helped her bootstrap to $25M ARR. "Someone somewhere told us not to build code for our solution until we had a customer interview that made someone cry because - cry in a good way! - because they were so excited that their problem was finally getting a solution... And we did. At first when I heard it, I was like, of course no one is going to cry because this is not the type of problem that makes people cry. But we eventually did get someone who cried in a demo, and that's when we knew they were ready to build the code." Martha shares:

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by SC Moatti, Managing Partner at Mighty Capital and SaaStock USA 2024 speaker extraordinaire, as she shares how to fix a broken GTM. "When you talk to product folks, what they love is they love good products. I mean, that's their nature. It's that idea that the best product wins is actually becoming a reality. Because when you sell to product people, they want to make sure you have a good product that's going to nicely integrate in their stack and we can talk about what makes a good product, but that's what wins right now." SC shares:

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Denis Mosolov, Managing Partner Venture Debt at Flashpoint, as he discusses what's out there (from a founder's perspective) if you don't want to dilute. "It's a big challenge for us, because you know if your company's really going to take-off and show growth levels that are exciting for the VC community, you do need to invest and you do need to know how to raise capital. That's a skill that the founders need to have and so it is a red flag for me if something is like 100% bootstrapped, because there's a big question mark - 'are you guys actually able to raise capital?'" Denis shares:

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Matthijs Welle, CEO at Mews, who shares his lessons building Mews to unicorn status and $100M ARR. "Recognise when we've got a challenge and address it. And I surround myself with phenomenal people, I'm not afraid of hiring people that are smarter than me around me, because I'm not always the smartest person. I have more context than anyone else, but these people lift me, and I think the best managers do that - they just find phenomenal talent and then trust that they are not going to be fighting, but showing up for the job and lifting you for the manager that you are." Matthijs shares: - Mews' founding story - from frustrations with a big marble block to building the next generation infrastructure system for hotels - The company's growth path (including 40 new hires MoM!) - From eight acquisitions to receiving $110M on top of raising a round - the pivotal moments speed and drive overlapped with opportunity - The ONE role that h

From the SaaStock USA 2023 Stage, Des Traynor (Co-founder & CSO at Intercom) discusses the 'Great AI Revolution', exploring just how epic the disruption could be. After many decades of over-promising and under-delivering, the AI revolution has finally arrived. Like every disruptive wave in software before it, it brings a whole host of opportunities for new market entrants, and threats for market incumbents. This talk is all about how to understand the new capabilities that have landed, think through product opportunities they imply, and ultimately capitalise on them, whether you’re a scrappy startup in its embryonic stage, or an established incumbent paranoid about the future. Check out the other ways SaaStock is serving SaaS founders

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Todd Olson, founder & CEO of Pendo, who shares his lessons in building Pendo well past $100M ARR. "I would say we're more aggressive than the average company. First off, there's rules. We are not a custom software shop, I do not build things for one customer. However, if there's something on our roadmap anyway and it's, I don't know, let's say, 12 months from now, and this prospect needs it now or sooner, I am willing to rearrange things. As I tell my prod teams "don't get married to your roadmap", married means you have emotional attachment to it and that you can't move things around, because what better proxy for prioritisation than speaking with the customer and them saying "I will buy now if you have it now"." Todd shares: - Pendo's founding story - The greatest signal of prioritisation a business can have - His philosophy of 'hiring for pain' - The impact active coaching had on his team - Their two year journey from $1M-

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by founder & CEO lempire and SaaStock 2024 speaker, Guillaume Moubeche, as he shares how Lempire scaled from $10M to $23M ARR in two years (bootstrapped!). "I was not ambitious enough, for me my ambition was to get a salary so I could help my girlfriend at the time paying the rent. Eventually, having someone, you know, who sees things 10 to 20x bigger for yourself than you, is actually amazing and I think that was the biggest helper that basically forced me to think of things at a way bigger and larger scale." He shares: - Why achieving PMF doesn't mean everlasting success - Understanding the 'S curve' and its implications on a business - How his upbringing encouraged the bootstrapped mindset - If de-risking and ambition go hand in hand - The ultimate founder hack (bank loans up to 7x of your EBITDA) - Fostering motivation within the team and more!Check out the other ways SaaStock is serving SaaS founders

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Peter Berg, Managing Partner at M12, who shares how AI will be used in the software industry. "It's definitely changing, I think, the dynamic of the way software gets built, the speed at which it can get built. There are a lot of amazing tools. I mean, GitHub, obviously is one in the Microsoft ecosystem. GitHub copilot has been transformative, I think for developers, we've heard that from them directly, and I think that's only going to continue in the way software both gets built and as also the notion of what software is might potentially change as well." Peter shares: - His journey scaling Visa Ventures into a global program - How M12 source deal flow opportunities - The net new experiences and possibilities that are going to be created as a result of AI - Modernising legacy infrastructure with AI - The unintended consequences that may be on the horizon and more! ---   Check out the other ways SaaStock is serving SaaS founder

From the SaaStock USA 2023 Stage, Thomas Smale (Founder and CEO of global M&A advisory firm FE International) shares what he’s learned from more than $1 billion in closed deals. Thomas shares: - Behind-the-scenes insights into which business models lead to the biggest exit prices - The business types that are most popular with buyers - How you can build a high-value business poised for a smooth exit and more! --- Check out the other ways SaaStock is serving SaaS founders

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show our host Alex Theuma is joined by Barb Hyman, founder & CEO at Sapia.ai, who shares how she overcame three big challenges to build an enterprise AI SaaS and raise $25M. "So we tried and we didn't succeed in building a new category. We had this concept a couple of years ago when we rebranded to Sapia that we were going to build this category around smart interviewer. And reality is it takes a lot of money, it takes a lot of commitment, consistency, and focus. And we realised that we were too insular, we were too leading with our product rather than really leading with your problems. And so we've really pivoted now to focus less on the category and much more on "here's the value that you get". Barb shares: - The pervasive bias in tech companies and tackling mirror hiring - Why she believes the resume should've died a long time ago - How Sapia have scaled the science of a structured interview - Raising their $25M series A (incl having their largest customer inves

From the SaaStock 2023 Bootstrap Stage, Jonathan Klahr (Managing Director at Susquehanna Growth Equity) is joined by Gregory Galant (Co-founder & CEO at Muck Rack) as he shares his journey of bootstrapping to $50M ARR and then raising a $180M Series A. Gregory shares: - Top lessons learned - Key moments and changing challenges on his way to bootstrapping to $50M ARR - When the turning point was when deciding to become VC backed and more! --- Check out the other ways SaaStock is serving SaaS founders

In this episode of the SaaS Revolution Show, our host Alex Theuma is joined by Brendan Noud, co-founder & CEO at LearnUpon, who shares LearnUpon's journey scaling to $30M ARR and beyond. "We're now rolling out proper territories, which we really haven't had, loosely up to now. But now we properly have that for our team, it's obviously a much bigger sales team, just the importance of functions like revops, starting to get into that level of data, and how you scale your go-to-market becomes much more important." Brendan shares: - His entrepreneurial journey; from tax returns at 11 years old to strategy consulting at KPMG - Why LearnUpon chose to bootstrap for their first 8 years - The ONE thing LearnUpon does to ensure team members are truly bought-in to the company's journey - The biggest accelerator that founders can control and how it leads to great growth - How they went from $10M to $30M ARR in four years (and their plan to get to $100M by 2030!) - How they navigated expanding into new markets and m