RO 💰 RevOperators’ Post

Thinking of transitioning from a SI to an ISV? It's a bold move with high stakes. SIs excel in customizing Salesforce solutions, but stepping into the ISV realm means developing and maintaining your own product—a journey fraught with risks and a steep learning curve. I have seen countless established implementation partners fail in this transition because they underestimate the change management efforts required to adopt a culture focused on an ARR model. The sales process, customer success, and virtually all other operational dynamics are completely different, requiring new skillsets and an adjustment to new success metrics. You transition from custom solution development to product management, which is an entirely different ballgame. You also have to forego the big deals you have been accustomed to—for a few years at least—and accept delayed rewards. This is a significant drawback. As a result, the vast majority of partners experimenting with this model fail and post $0 in ARR. Or worse, they are stuck managing a handful of customers for low subscription fees, which ends up being a lose-lose situation. If you still want to proceed: ✅ Start by selling an MVP at a low cost (so if you need to transition your customers, it’s less painful). If it doesn’t work, simply label it as a custom solution and move on. ✅ Spin up a separate company nested under your services business with a dedicated sales team—a must. ✅ Don’t expect overnight results. Thank me later! P.S.: I haven’t studied this outside of Salesforce, but I believe the same principles apply to any ecosystem.

📢 Tips for all the Salesforce SI's looking to transition to a SaaS business

I have a problem with product led growth. I would prefer if software companies would try product led adoption first. Or how about product led profitability? Chasing growth with product means we see a lot of software that seem to have given up on even finishing what they already built. Want an example? I will be repeating myself, but how about this stupid feature in the Salesforce admin tools? And there are many many more like this in almost every tool I use. I will say it again - SaaS companies, growth is good, but profitability is better. And that comes from adoption. So try shifting your thinking to product led adoption. Or in my case, product led happiness. Please.

Here's my 4 step framework for delivering the Perfect SaaS Demo: I used this on every single big deal I closed at Salesforce: Too many AE’s *think* they deliver a great demo... But then the customer goes totally dark. Why? Because the demo was given prematurely. Before the deal was properly qualified. Therefore is wasn’t tailored to their specific needs, pain points, and use cases. When this happens, you position your solution as a “nice to have.” Not a “must have.” And “nice to have” solutions don’t cut it when budgets are tight. And 2024 will be no different. If you want to deliver a compelling SaaS demo that lands every time, you must run proper discovery BEFORE giving away a demo. This will enable you to run a “custom demo,” uniquely tailored to each company. Watch the free 13 minute training for my demo formula. P.S. Want me as your sales coach in 2024? Book a call here: https://lnkd.in/gsr474YU #sales #saas #salestraining