SaaStr 2017: My takeaways from day 2

 SaaStr Annual 2017 packed the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium

Yesterday I returned for Day 2 of the SaaStr Annual 2017 conference at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in SF. Zoom.us CEO Eric Yuan went on stage and declared SaaStr Annual as our Superbowl of SaaS. I think he's right. Here are some of my takeaways from Day 2 of SaaStr Annual 2017.

  Twilio Founder Jeff Lawson with Jason Lemkin

SaaStr Annual 2017: Veeva: The Biggest Vertical SaaS Success Story of All Time

  Veeva CEO Peter Gassner does not follow the herd

• Do not give away professional services.
• There is no chance to be great if all you are doing is following the herd.
• Revenue follows the people.
• Pricing is relative at big software companies.
• You can't sell something for more $ than the customer gets in value over the long term.
• "I like to focus on the value."
• Veeva is a mission-driven digital disruption.
• "I'm a Swiss American. I like trains to run on time."
• "Good enough is not good enough."
• "Execution matters most. Over the long term, any good idea gets copied. Execution does not."
• Adjacent Possible: Every three weeks, take a day off and meet with someone outside the industry.

SaaStr Annual 2017: Get to $100m ARR While Burning Almost Nothing: 6 Learnings in 6 Years

  Zoom.us CEO Eric Yuan calls SaaStr Annual the Superbowl of SaaS

• Started Zoom 6 yrs ago.
• Crowded market (video conferencing) but no happy customers.
• Focused on existing customers and sustainable growth.
• Don't wait to raise until you need it.
• First $1M ARR was the hardest.
• Always wanted to have a billboard. So he got billboards.
• 40 min. free by Zoom. 45 min. is the most effective meeting length.
• Zoom NPS is at 69. Everyone else in the space is at 20.
• Big believer in making the work place a happy place.
• "This is our Superbowl moment for SaaS companies."

SaaStr Annual 2017: AI: The New Platform for SaaS

  Tom Tunguz packed the room for his presentation

• What is ML really? Optimize, Identify objects, Anomalies, Segmentation.
• There's a Convergence of three trends around ML.
• ML will be as huge as iPhone and cloud.
• Tunguz loves speech recognition.
• ML is hidden, doing work behind the scenes.
• Why is the customer going to care about your ML solution? You still have to provide value.
• "If you're wrong in ML you lose the trust of the user."
• ML with humans relationships need to build trust first.
• What value can a startup add on top of mono cloud platforms like AWS ML?
• Access to proprietary data for ML: Create it yourself or have customers give you access to theirs.

SaaStr Annual 2017: 12 Key Levers of SaaS Success

• A simple model is needed to understand a SaaS business.
• 3 phases of a SaaS startup: Product market fit /Search for repeatable results & scalable growth / Scaling the business
• SaaS funnel: Onboard, Retain, Expand.
• SaaS funnel governed by simple math: Top of funnel deal flow & Conversion rate.
• 2 sales motions: Touchless & Sales people.
• Not all lead sources equal.
• Fix the conversion rate first before spending on heavy traffic.
• Find the optimal customer segments.
• Clear simple powerful messaging is often missing.
• Every funnel will have blockage problems. Can find it by asking "what happens if revenue grows 10x in 12 months?"
• Can you trigger someone into a buying process via marketing?
• Microfunnels: What is your Wow! Moment?
• Sales Teams: Sales people have a ramp time and capacity limit. Unit growth becomes amount of sales people on staff.
• Top piece of advice: Optimize the funnel.
• Diagram the funnel: Draw micro steps for key parts.

SaaStr Annual 2017: The Unconventional Road to 20,000 Customers

  Edghan McCabe just wants to build cool stuff

• Constantly question previously held beliefs.
• Core motivator is to create and make.
• Wrote a lot of blogs in the beginning. Genuine authentic content. Very good results.
• Spread the message far and wide via content. Customers and investors came to them.
• "Any conversation a customer is willing to have with us is a privilege."

Kickass @SaaStrAnnual w/ @jasonlk pic.twitter.com/zNyshBxAtq

— Hoala Greevy (@HoalaGreevy) February 9, 2017

SEE ALSO: My Takeaways from SaaStr Annual 2017 Conference (Day 1)

SEE ALSO: My Takeaways from SaaStr Annual 2017 Conference (Day 3)