How to scale your SaaS sales

How to scale your SaaS sales

Founded in 2005, LucidEra was a SaaS startup offering analysis of CRM and ERP data. The company went out of business in 2009, after running into problems with longer sales cycles and its go-to market strategy. The customer base they focused on was sales departments, and the company relied on Salesforce's CRM data, for the most part. However, they did not combine it with data from marketing and finance departments. Like LucidEra, several other SaaS companies have collapsed after inflows of VC funding and failed to scale as a result. Any SaaS startup needs to be confident of their services and pricing, and target the right audience. Once you have a killer product, all you need are a few clear cut sales strategies to aim high. 

​

 1. Sales and marketing go hand in hand. 

One common mistake most startups make is cold calling just about anybody on their lead list. This not only wastes a lot of time on the sales rep's part, but is also highly inefficient. Generating leads through marketing webinars, conferences, seminars, and social media can help drive sales drastically. Make sure to invest in your marketing strategy, as much as in sales and development.


 

 2. Choose your battles wisely. 

 

Not all deals necessarily generate a profit. Suppose a lead requires you to travel a lot or drags on for ages, taking up valuable time and resources of your sales representative, and it turns out it isn't really worth it. Don't just take any deal that comes your way. Define a set of guidelines for your organization's sales strategy, and stick to it.

 

  3. Customer retention is key.

 

While closing new deals is imperative to scale sales, it's second only to customer retention. Imagine you've closed a deal a couple of years ago worth 10 grand. You've been struggling to close a new deal with a similar amount for the past six months. But that customer from a couple of years back was not properly onboarded, doesn't really have in-depth knowledge of the product, and receives the same impersonal message from support every time. The customer is not satisfied and moves on to a new product. You on the other hand win your new deal, after having spent 6 months of resources. So how have you profited from this exchange?

Scale your support alongside your sales, and you might just hit that balance.

 

 

4. Scale up, don't shave off. 

 

What makes more sense: promoting a few of your experienced sales reps to sales managers, or sticking your rep in the same job for years and paying someone new a ton of money to do the same work? The former leads to greater employee satisfaction and more productivity because they are motivated to put forth their best effort. Instead of starting from scratch with a whole new team, fill the manager positions in-house with the most experienced sales reps.  Then hire one new rep to fill their shoes 

 


5. Give credit where credit is due. 

 

Now this happens in a lot of firms. The superstar of the sales team is the person who bagged a deal worth a hundred grand. Another rep who spends all week closing 10 deals of 10 grand each isn't given the same credit. Laud every employee to what they're due. 


 

6. Go freemium! 

 

Most companies boast stellar prices for their product first and hike it up after a while. Fix your product's price and stick to it. If you think your product is worth the price tag, don't worry that it's on the higher end. Offer a free subscription for the first 15-30 days, and, if it's worth it, your prospect will take the bait. Or you can offer a freemium model indefinitely, with basic features limiting the number of users. Once your user has gotten comfortable and hits their limit or sees the need for more features, they can pay for an upgraded version. A way to stave off users who unsubscribe after a few months is by offering a lower budgeted annual subscription, as opposed to the slightly pricier monthly subscription. 


 

7. Integrate with other products.

 

Let's face it. Your product might be great, but there's always a product out there that has a feature yours doesn't. Facilitating integrations and plugins can really boost your sales. Build a marketplace for your product before you pitch anything to your prospect. 


 

8. You can't do everything yourself. 

 

If you want to go international, you're going to need some help. If you're just starting your business, there's no way you'll be able to set up offices all over the globe. Instead, forge partnerships and get resellers for markets away from home. It's a win-win situation for both parties, and you'll be cutting costs phenomenally. 


 

9. Get listed and reviewed. 

You need a bit of publicity, if you want to climb up the ladder. Get yourself listed on sites such as producthunt.com and capterra.com for ratings and reviews of products, and leverage your product to customers. 

 

10. Network, network, network. 

 

Want valid prospects? Attend tradeshows, meetups, and seminars. Or even better, hold your own meetups, seminars, and workshops for your product, after due marketing research, of course, and gain prospects. This kind of networking allows you to give prosepcts a hands-on experience and interact with them one on one, improving your credibility and your chances of making a sale. 

 

Every Fortune 500 company out there will tell you that there's no simple shortcut to scale your sales. But perhaps with the right sales & marketing strategy, you could bypass roadblocks along the way and get there a few times bigger and stronger than you were before. Not because sales might be the backbone of SaaS businesses, but because it works hand in hand with every other aspect of your organization. 


    • Sticky Posts

    • As Sales Person, Here are my New Year Resolutions. What are Yours?

      Being a salesperson, I keep learning from my mistakes and have noted a few changes that I need to make in my approach. I take these resolutions going into 2021, hoping to keep it going for as long as possible :) 1. I will not say "Yes, our product has

    • Once Upon a Sales Meeting!

      It was an awkward silence in the meeting room "Uproar." John Kowalski, the new sales manager, was not happy with the team's performance. After scribbling something in the notepad, he decided to break the silence, John: I cannot believe you guys have been working like this. No reports, delusional forecasting, random targets, and no eye on the ball. Kevin: We followed Richard's orders. John: Well, Richard is not here anymore, is he? John walked up to the whiteboard, and wrote in big bold letters: "TARGET

    • Recent Topics

    • Update Multi select field values to another form table as individual record

      Hi, I am new to coding and do basics within deluge. I need help with the deluge script to meet the following requirement. Form Student Attendance The fields are : Attendance Date Course (Lookup to Course Form) Class (Lookup to Class Form) Students (Multi

    • Why Doesn't TrueSync Desktop App Have an Auto-Update Feature?

      I have to manually update the app myself. I think it's a big shortcoming.

    • Link Zoho Inventory to Clover POS

      Is it possible to link zoho Inventory to Clover POS?

    • How can I start trial version without any example data?

      I am lazy to manually delete each data in every section. Is there any button to fresh start my account from zero?

    • Send Whatsapp with API including custom placeholders

      Is is possible to initiate a session on whatsapp IM channel with a template that includes params (placeholders) that are passed on the API call? This is very usefull to send a Utility message for a transactional notification including an order number

    • Building a custom site

      do we have an option in Zoho to build custom sites like adding custom functionalities? want to make a site like https://trackscourier.com/jnt-tracking-ph/. Is it doable? Please assist.

    • Free developer edition of Zoho CRM

      A question for Zoho and other developers: How can you set up a demonstration version of a Zoho CRM implementation to show employers/clients what can be achieved? Do you pay for Zoho CRM Enterprise/Zoho One for this purpose? Does Zoho offer a free version

    • Confirmation prompt before a custom button action is triggered

      Have you ever created a custom button and just hoped that you/your users are prompted first to confirm the action? Well, Zoho knows this concept. For example, in blueprint, whenever we want to advance to the next state by clicking the transition, it is

    • Selecting ZOHO Help Desk Plan for Startup

      Hello everyone, We at unisouk are setting up a Product support team for our platform. and probably we will be team of 3-5 people. Which plan would cater my needs to address customer technical queries and maintain the inflow of various channel queries

    • Where do we manage tags?

      Where is the page where we can view all tags and manage them (like change a tag name to something else or merge tickets under a particular tag with another)?

    • Possibilité de créer des boutons de raccourci dans les tickets Zoho Desk

      Bonjour, J'ai développé plusieurs automatisations avec Zoho Deluge pour optimiser la gestion des tickets. Je souhaiterais savoir s’il est possible de créer des boutons de raccourci directement accessibles dans l’interface des tickets afin de déclencher

    • Update to the Merge Tickets Functionality

      This is to inform you about a significant update to the Merge Tickets functionality in Zoho Desk.  Until now, while merging tickets, a user could set one ticket as the master ticket and choose the final value for any field from any of the secondary tickets too. As a result of this provision, many a time, crucial details related to the master ticket faced the risk of being excluded in the final, merged ticket. To overcome this challenge, we have decided to make the value of some critical fields unchangeable,

    • Setting up CRM for RFP workflow management

      This will be the first time our organization uses an off-the-shelf CRM, transitioning from our homegrown custom solution, and I would appreciate general thoughts on how to get started in general with our workflow using Zoho CRM. The main question: if

    • Integrating Calendly with Zoho Calendar in Zoho Mail

      I moved my office into a business incubator space that uses Calendly for meeting management and events. Calendly doesn't have a integration with Zoho Calendar and vice versa. I was directed to Zapier for integration but it doesn't have an integration

    • How to send binary data in invokeurl task?

      Hello, I am using Adobe's Protect PDF API. Source: https://developer.adobe.com/document-services/docs/overview/pdf-services-api/ Everything works fine in Postman. But for some reason after encrypting the file, it is empty after password protecting the

    • Unable to access Zoho Desk at all - has an extreme slow load and then just remains blank

      This is all I see:

    • Demande : Épingler automatiquement un commentaire via Deluge

      Bonjour, Je suis utilisateur de Zoho Desk et j'ai développé une fonction avec Zoho Deluge permettant d'ajouter automatiquement un type de commentaire à chaque création de ticket. Cependant, j'aimerais pouvoir épingler ces commentaires directement depuis

    • Unknown error occurred

      Hi, When we want to publish or edit a page in our website, we encounter with "Unknown error occurred" problem. I share a screenshot here. Our website is www.essoft.com. It happens every page. We want to solve this ASAP.

    • Using Creator API access tokens in deluge script

      I am working on generating download urls for files that are uploaded via a creator form. I want to include these urls in record templates so they can be easily accessed. The goal is to make downloading multiple attachments in a record as quick and easy

    • Option to Re-order from past orders

      Customers would like to place a repeat order with the business entity. Currently there is no option to support this and everytime the customer has to check out following the same process. Can a option be given to reorder from the past orders?

    • Display your zoho contact name when they call your mobile number

      As per the title If a contact calls the office number, the contacts name shows on mobile as long as I have their contact details registered in my crm. Is there a way that if the contact calls my mobile, their name can be displayed? Currently just their number shows when they call.

    • US to EU Data Migration done / Workflows and Custom Functions stopped working

      Hello, I need help to restore my workflow rules and custom functions to work. My data was transferred from the US to the EU (Data center migration). Now all Workflow Rules and Custom Functions not working. I have no idea how to restore them to work again.

    • Custom view for Milestones

      Hi, Just an idea for the future... would it be possible to create custom views for the Milestones view under Work Overview ? I usually need to look at this view filtered by project group but the filter doesn't remain when navigating away. A custom view

    • Zoho API Error Code 7019 when adding job.

      Hello, I am following the documentation found here. https://www.zoho.com/people/api/timesheet/adding-jobs.html Regardless of how I try and post the data (including just using the example requests), I receive back the response {'response': {'message':

    • Getting error during inserting a record in form of zoho people using zoho api

      import requests import json # Set your access token and Zoho People API base URL access_token = '1000.XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX.XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX' api_base_url = 'https://people.zoho.in/people/api/' # Set the form name and data to be inserted form_link_name

    • Email an Invoice from API

      When calling the API to email an invoice, it seems it does not actually send it. Below is a screen shot where I used an API call for the bottom record, and it updated its' status to "Due Today", but no email was actually sent. The top record, I hit the

    • How to delete Email Sent From CRM from Contact Records

      I can't figure out how to delete email sent form CRM from contact records. Can you please advise? 

    • Recurring Events Not Appearing in "My Events" and therefore not syncing with Google Apps

      We use the Google Sync functionality for our events, and it appears to have been working fine except: I've created a set of recurring events that I noticed were missing from my Google Apps calendar. Upon further research, it appears this is occurring

    • Is there a Kanban view of Tasks across all Projects?

      As the title indicates, I could use a Kanban view of my Tasks across my Projects. If it's there, I don't see it. If it isn't there, I'd like to submit this as a feature request. Thx.

    • CRM Deluge how can link attach file with workdrive file.

      Hi, We have create file at workdrive and would like to link to attachment at crm module by deluge. Right now can only upload it to attachment but can not link the file from workdrive. Thank you

    • Tropicalize Books

      Books is an incredibly powerful tool that works well in many countries. But I feel that it is a product that is not yet "tropicalized" for Brazil as we speak (this would be like adapting the local reality). We have many strong competitors who do more

    • Refund of a check distribution fee...

      I use cashiers checks, from my local credit union, to pay some bills very occasionally. They charge me a 5.00 fee for this service, but then refund me that same amount at the end of the month on my statement. How would I record this transaction in Zoho

    • Usuários do Zoho Recruit no Brasil

      Gostaríamos de interagir com outros usuários do Zoho Recruit. Acabamos de completar um ano de utilização. Quem mais usa? se usa outra qual é?

    • Zoho Creator Upcoming Updates - December 2024

      Hi all, We're excited to be back with the latest updates and developments on the Creator platform. Here's what we're going over this month: Deluge AI assistance Rapid error messages in Deluge editor QR code & barcode generator Expandable RTF and multi

    • Questions about To Do

      1. I created a To Do note on Android and there is a line sorting option in the options drop down menu. But I didn’t find such an option in the PC client. I really need this option. 2. Why is there no search in To Do on the PC client? 3. Why is there no

    • Introducing Offer Details Sync to Zoho People

      We've introduced a new option for the Zoho People integration that allows you to push offer details when a candidate is converted to an employee. This simplifies your recruitment-to-onboarding process by seamlessly syncing critical offer information,

    • Conversion of functions from Google Spreadsheets

      Hello! I use this formula "=QUERY(ResumoOrdemVencimento!A3:O38;"SELECT A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,J,K,L,M,N,O WHERE C != '' ORDER BY C,G")" in Google Sheets but when importing my spreadsheet into Zoho Sheets the formula was not converted. The QUERY function brings data from another spreadsheet, and then I sort and apply conditional formatting. The order of data will change automatically as I update the source spreadsheet. What Zoho Sheets function is equivalent to QUERY? I have some other spreadsheets to

    • Copy, Duplicate, or Clone a Custom View?

      I searched the forums and didn't see anything on the subject. Is there a way to copy, duplicate or clone a custom view? I want a custom view similar to one I've already created. I just want the columns in different order.

    • Import from OneNote

      Is there a way to import notes from OneNote? 

    • In Zoho Forms - adding a Zoho CRM field for Contact barely shows any fields.

      I'm making a Zoho Form and I want to add a CRM field for Contact. I was expecting to be able to match the contact on the email address provided in the form. My standard layout has lots of fields but for some reason on the dropdown list in Zoho Forms,

    • Next Page