In my talk at the 2017 SaaStr Annual conference, the goal was to offer a simple model of a SaaS business and highlight key areas for optimization within the SaaS funnel. Watch the video presentation to learn the key levers a CEO can pull to make the greatest impact to their business.

(video from SaaStr Annual 2017)

To get an idea for what I talk about in the video above, you can take a look through the accompanying slide deck presentation here:

During my talk, I only had time to touch on each key lever at a high level. For more learnings, I wanted to share a list of resources that will help you dig deeper into each of the key levers within the SaaS funnel:

Product/market fit

Top of the funnel flow

SaaS Metrics 2.0 – A Guide to Measuring and Improving What Matters : A comprehensive look the foundation of key metrics needed to understand and optimize a SaaS business.

Conversion rates

Customer Acquisition: Maximizing your Funnel : Optimize the customer acquisition funnel by getting inside customers’ heads to analyze and remove blockage points.

Growth Hacking: Creating a Wow! Moment : Create a Wow! moment to help customers truly understand and experience the value of your product.

CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost)

How Sales Complexity Impacts Your Startup’s Viability : Understanding sales cycle complexity and the impact it has on customer acquisition cost (CAC).

Startup Killer: The Cost of Customer Acquisition : How to avoid one of the biggest causes of startup failure by understanding the true cost of acquiring customers.

Number of salespeople

Recruiting: The Third Crucial Startup Skill : Building the strongest recruiting funnel possible to find and hire the best talent.

A Shockingly Common Way that Sales Misses Plan : How a good sales hiring plan can help you get ahead of the curve and achieve sales targets.

PPR (Productivity Per Rep)

Sales Development Metrics and Compensation Report : A set of benchmarks providing insight into sales organization structure, ramp, productivity, quota, tenure and more.

Getting enough leads

Inside Sales Best Practices: HubSpot – A Case Study : Hiring, onboarding and how to engineer the relationship between sales and marketing to drive the number of deals closed.

Pricing

Scalable Pricing: A Key Tool for SaaS Success : A breakdown of scalable pricing and how it provides a powerful tool to grow revenue in a SaaS business.

Customer retention rate, Dollar retention rate, Months to recover CAC

Key Drivers for SaaS Success : A comprehensive look at the metrics you must understand to optimize a SaaS business.

Recruiting, onboarding & management