Where is Service in Software-as-a-Service (SaaS)?
Like many entrepreneurs of my generation, I was always in awe of SaaS business model. And of course, wanted to build one. In fact I got an opportunity to see some of these companies being built from close quarters due to my part-time angel investing career, and in a couple of cases, a little more […]
The Secret Sauce to Growth: Hiring Right Sales Talent
When it comes to driving growth, hiring exceptional sales and growth talent is non-negotiable. We all know the usual skills that we should look at. Yet, there are a few critical skills that one often overlooks during the hiring process. These can be the difference between a rainmaker and an average hire. 1) Positive Energy: […]
Empowering the Frontline: The Key to Digital Transformation Success
Why are some of the most amazing products not delivering ROI? Keyword is adoption The question is WIIFM (What’s in it for me?) Most of the time software is bought by senior management, who want the frontline workers to key in information from ground zero, and get all insights in their glass office to make […]
The Science of Sales Performance Management: Sales – Effort vs. Booking vs. Cashflow
If you are selling to an enterprise, managing sales performance needs you to understand two important concepts: – Leading and lagging indicators – Sales cycle and cash cycle It is very common that leaders create an aggressive sales plan with their team, only to realise towards the end of the financial year that they have […]
The Art of Selling Services in a Competitive Market.
In a crowded services market, it becomes a challenge to identify the service that you should pitch to a client to maximize your chance of winning. I follow a method which I call “The Golden Triangle” which is the common overlap between: 1) Demand/hype, 2) High LTV/Value and 3) Right to Win/Expertise I always believe […]
Factors I consider while choosing a Sales Channel
There are several options for selling a product or service – direct, bidding, expos, dealer network, partner network, online, referral, affiliate, brand stores, shop-in-shop, etc. 1) Volume: What is the volume of business available in the channel? When is this channel going to get saturated? What percentage of my TAM (Total addressable market) can I […]
Driving Growth – One Dimension at a time
Growth gets everyone excited. But it needs investment of cash, time, and effort. The extent of these investments depend upon the number of variables involved (and the possible values of these variables) in the growth strategy. Lesser variables mean higher probability of success, and hence low-cost growth, as it becomes easy to identify the point […]