Unstoppable Startup Strategy Guide

belief x discipline makes you unstoppable

The Unstoppable 5-Point SaaS Growth Strategy Guide

Hi. I’m TK. - Co-founded and sold HipCal to Plaxo - Worked at Bridgewater Associates (one of the best hedge funds) - Founded ToutApp, backed by a16z (one of the best vc ﬁrms) - Sold ToutApp to Marketo, backed by Vista (one of the best pe ﬁrms) - Helped sell Marketo to Adobe as SVP Strategy (for $4.75bn) - On a mission to help SaaS Founders become unstoppable 3 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

My Principles Come from 15 Years of Experience as a Founder, Venture Backed CEO, and Senior Executive across multiple SaaS businesses. 4 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Only 4% of Startups Graduate From The Seed Stage An estimated 92% of SaaS companies fail within three years despite growth and funding. 5 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Why Do Startups Fail? Source: CBInsights / 101 Startup Postmortems 6 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Where Do Us Founders Go Wrong? ✓ Cool name We can do ALL of these ✓ Logo things... ✓ Slick website ✓ Blog ✓ Social proﬁles ...and still end up with not ✓ ADs enough traction, no clear ✓ MVP or Full Product product market ﬁt, no ✓ SEO ✓ Press Release insights, and in the dead ✓ Raise $3m zone! 7 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Why? The people you’re talking to don’t care. But why? You’re not diﬀerentiated It’s not easy enough Even when you have a They don’t understand what you do GREAT product... You’re positioning it the wrong way This tends to happen when They don’t trust you (who the F are you again?) you don’t have a clear Market & Go-To-Market It’s just not important enough strategy. OR… You’re just talking to the wrong people 8 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

I Made the Same Mistakes In my own personal journey as a Startup Founder, and especially as a technical Founder, I made the same mistakes: - I over-indexed on Product and kept thinking I was that “one feature away” from PMF - I failed to embrace Sales and Marketing and thought if the product was good enough, then the market will speak for itself - I “interviewed” users, but didn’t know if they would actually buy if we did what they asked. 9 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Here’s the secret I discovered to beat that 96% failure trend... Winning SaaS Businesses Need A Clear & Articulated Growth Strategy Across 3 Key Pillars: Market, Product & Go-To-Market. 10 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

11 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Great SaaS Businesses Are Built On: 12 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Do You Need a Written Out Strategy? BEFORE AFTER “I just need to do “There are 3 major everything I can in all components to the success possible ways as hard as I of my startup -- I have a can so that I can grow my written thesis on what we top-line and if I do that need to do for each and we then… everything will just will keep iterating on it fall into place.” until we get to the pro-tip: everything won’t fall into place promised land.” 13 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

5 Key Components of Your Growth Strategy 1. Market Strategy 3 Major Components. Every great SaaS business 2. Product Strategy is built on these 3 core strategic pillars. 3. Go-To-Market Strategy 2 Supporting Components. 4. Funding Strategy These two components support and ensure the 5. Exit Strategy success of your business long term. 14 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

5 Key Components of Your Strategy 1. What is your Ideal Customer 1. Market Strategy Profile? When you’re starting out, the riches are in the niches. So be specific. (Watch my episode on How to Create 2. Product Strategy an ICP) 2. Are you going after a sufficiently sized total addressable market? 3. Go-To-Market Strategy Great markets can make even mediocre teams succeed. (Watch my episode on calculating your TAM) 4. Funding Strategy 3. Are you honing in on the right segment of the market that your 5. Exit Strategy product and your business is best equipped to serve? (Watch my episode on the power of Market Segmentation) 15 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

5 Key Components of Your Strategy 1. What is the core problem your 1. Market Strategy product solves? Is it a vitamin or a pain killer? (Watch my episode on defining your core product value 2. Product Strategy proposition) 2. Does it have a single player mode? 3. Go-To-Market Strategy Can a single customer get into the product and get immediate value without dependencies? (watch my 4. Funding Strategy episode on what makes a great product loop) 5. Exit Strategy 3. What is the core atomic unit for your product? (watch my episode on core SaaS metrics) 16 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

5 Key Components of Your Strategy 1. Watch my episode on the 6-Steps to 1. Market Strategy Creating a SaaS Go-To-Market Plan 2. Are you marketing driven or sales 2. Product Strategy driven? (watch my episode on the TWO types of SaaS growth engines) 3. Go-To-Market Strategy 3. What is your pricing strategy? Are you the low cost player? The boutique player? (watch my episode on SaaS 4. Funding Strategy Pricing Strategies) 4. What is your most important growth 5. Exit Strategy engine? Keep it simple and focus, focus, focus on the one that MOVES. (watch my episode on the Unstoppable Sales Funnel) 17 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

5 Key Components of Your Strategy 1. 12-Slide SaaS Pitch Deck Training 1. Market Strategy 2. What goes through an investor’s mind when pitching? (watch my Pitch 2. Product Strategy Meeting Teardown) 3. Have you pitched strategic angel 3. Go-To-Market Strategy investors? (watch my episode on strategic angels) 4. Funding Strategy 4. What’s the best way to fund your SaaS business? (watch my episode on the different funding options) 5. Exit Strategy 5. Watch my episode on Series A Readiness & Building Your Series A Pitch Deck 18 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

5 Key Components of Your Strategy 1. What is your exit strategy? 1. Market Strategy Profitability? M&A? IPO? 2. Who are the key players in your 2. Product Strategy space serving the same ICP? Spread them into Tier 1 (F500), 2 (Growth-stage), and 3 (Early Stage) 3. Go-To-Market Strategy 3. What is the strategy of the players in your space? Are they acquiring? 4. Funding Strategy Announcing new products? 4. Watch my episode on building an 5. Exit Strategy Exit strategy here 19 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

1-Page Strategy Challenge Now that you know the key components to growing your SaaS business, you may want to write it down into a 1-Page strategy so you can take stock of where you are. I’ve created a simple one-pager that you can ﬁll out to get started. This simple exercise will help you take stock of where you are and what the areas of improvement are for your SaaS business. 20 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Top Reasons Startups Fail Most of us SaaS Founders tend to over-index on Product ---- and don’t spend enough time building out a scalable & predictable Go-To-Market machine. (I had the same biases and learned to overcome them so that I could grow my businesses) 21 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Want to Build a Scalable GTM Machine? Inside my SaaS Go-To-Market Coaching Program, I help Founders build a scalable & predictable GTM machine by following a proven process so that they can accelerate their path to $3M+ ARR and the next round of funding. >>> Click here to learn more 22 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader

Thank You Thank you for checking out my Unstoppable SaaS Growth Strategy Guide. All the concepts and principles presented here are from 15+ years of building, scaling, and exiting SaaS businesses. I created this because I wish something like this existed when I was scaling my own SaaS businesses -- so I hope you found value in it! If you’re building your SaaS business, and have some revenues, but still need a scalable and predictable way to grow -- I invite you to schedule a 1on1 SaaS Growth Strategy call with me and see if I can help you grow faster through my coaching program. Click here to book your strategy call 23 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @tawheed Instagram: @tkkader