your competition now matters: building a saas company isn't what it used to be - hiten shah at...
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Building a SaaS Company Isn’t What It Used To Be: Your Competition Now Matters
Hiten [email protected]
What are the truths in business?
Forget about your competitors, just focus
on your customers.
Jack Ma Chairman of Alibaba Group
I have been up against tough competition all my life. I wouldn't know how to get along without it.
Walt Disney Entrepreneur
Truth: There’s a lot of conflicting advice about customers and competition
Truth: Everyone has competition in some form!
Truth: Aggressive competition is becoming a constant reality
Competitive advantage is a company's ability to perform in one or more ways that competitors
cannot or will not match.
Philip Kotler Author and Consultant
How do you compete?
Before you write any code. When you’re just starting out.
(with a new business or a new feature)
TODO:
Take the time to do thorough research up front
It’s faster to research than to write code. Upfront depth prevents you from building the wrong things.
Ask people what tools they have used
Ask people how they currently do things
“If you’re above 40% of the people saying they’d be very disappointed, I tend to say you’ve found product/market fit, and if
you’re less than that, you haven’t.
SEAN ELLIS
We found out that Google Analytics has product/market fit
AND SO MUCH MORE!
It started with a single question: What’s wrong with Google Analytics site overlays?
Back in 2005 we put up an early access landing page
Google Analytics site overlay is only based on page level data
Crazy Egg tracked every single click on the page
I was a competitive advantage!
It started with a single question: What’s wrong with Google Analytics funnels?
What we learned was wrong with Google Analytics funnels
• Built in one month from blank slate to release
• Used EC2, S3, Ruby and SQLite (yes, SQLite)
• Horribly slow and ugly code with bugs
• Took 7 servers for just 30 customers
The KISSmetrics MVP of 2009
We invented a 10x better API
We invented a live debugging tool for analytics events
We invented a better funnel report
The “ghetto” KISSmetrics MVP worked!!!
“I can already tell you that your killer feature (for now, at least) is retroactive funnel definition. Brilliant.”
Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of
learnings.
Bill Gates Co-Founder of Microsoft
Your competitor’s most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learnings.
💡
Funnel reports used to always be top to bottom
Funnel reports used to always be top to bottom
After we invented them at KISSmetrics, many other tools
started to add left to right funnels
If it’s good for customers, it’ll get imitated by competitors
and become the norm.
Inventing Things
AWS publicly launched EC2 and S3 in 2006
• We got Crazy Egg on S3 in 2006
• Costs were cut by 50% from switching to EC2
• Continuous improvement and new useful services
• Enables a faster pace of iteration
• Constant price reduction
Why I Love Amazon Web Services (AWS)
It’s now easier than ever to create software.
And it’s gonna keep getting easier!
There are only two sources of competitive advantage:
Ability to learn more about our customers faster than the competition.
Ability to turn that learning into action faster than the competition.
Jack Welch Retired Business Executive
When do competitors show up in customer’s minds?
Ask your customers about competitors very directly
Find out how your product can be improved
Use strategic interviewing to learn why people switch
Jobs-to-be-done Timeline
First thought
Event 1
Event 2
Purchase
Passive Consideration
Active Consideration
Decision
A timeline must be completed for each interview. The goal is to use the interview technique to identify key events that have caused them to hire the product.
“There’s a rise in all-in-one SaaS software and SaaS platforms.
2006 2011 2014
Three thriving examples of the All-In-One SaaS trend
All-In-One Marketing Software
HubSpot wants to manage all your inbound marketing
HubSpot wants to manage all your inbound marketing
• Created a website grader to generate leads by identifying a website’s short comings.
• Started by targeting small businesses that weren’t technically savvy.
• Expanded the offering by creating a new suite of SaaS sales tools.
The single platform for
every customer interaction
Intercom wants to manage all customer communications
Intercom wants to manage all customer communications
• Built a single customer communications workflow that serves many different jobs.
• Started by targeting startups who weren’t yet hooked on existing tools.
• Iterated into a platform with multiple products.
All-In-One Analytics and
Feedback
Hotjar wants to provide every tool for website insights
Hotjar wants to provide every tool for website insights
• Put seven feedback and analytics tools next to each other in a single interface.
• Started by offering a cheaper solution to professionals who are already using multiple tools.
• Their product roadmap is shared publicly.
SaaS product suites and platforms are making a comeback!
~$1.82B market cap
$115.75M funding
213,273 organizations
This is the one big idea for you to take action on, ASAP!
TODO:
Take the time to do thorough research up front
It’s faster to research than to write code. Upfront depth prevents you from building the wrong things.
