Episode 18

full
Published on:

6th Feb 2024

Legends of GTM: Eloqua's Founder Talks Category Creation - Mark Organ

Many entrepreneurs dream of creating categories. But few have actually done it - much less built a category worth billions of dollars.

Mark Organ is one of those rare few. As founding CEO of Eloqua, he pioneered marketing automation in the early 2000s, paving the way for other players and selling to Oracle for nearly $900 million.

Mark and I chat through how he co-founded Eloqua, the pivots and experiments needed to achieve product-market fit, and how category creators may be wired a bit differently.

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About Today's Guest

Mark Organ is the founding CEO of Eloqua (the first successful marketing automation platform) and Influitive. His greatest professional passions include creating new billion-dollar categories in technology and developing new leaders. Today he helps CEOs achieve their full potential in their businesses and their lives as the CEO of Categorynauts.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/markorgan/

Key Topics

  • [00:00] - Introduction
  • [01:05] - Founding Eloqua and marketing automation
  • [07:47] - Origin of the lead generation playbook
  • [10:39] - Getting to product-market fit
  • [16:03] - Genesis of lead scoring
  • [19:08] - Toolkit software vs. opinionated software
  • [24:25] - Pivots and brushes with death are the norm
  • [27:09] - When is it right to build a category?
  • [30:14] - Building a category around an under-served hero
  • [33:51] - Creating a category for the second time
  • [36:42] - Challenges with churn at Influitive
  • [41:05] - Alternatives to VC funding in SaaS

Resource Links

  • Categorynauts - Categorynauts is the leading global community of category creating leaders, helping CEOs looking to discover, develop and dominate their category.

Learn More

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Transcript
Justin Norris:

You're listening to RevOps FM with Justin Norris.

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Welcome to RebOps FM.

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And today we chat with Mark Organ,

the founding CEO of not just one,

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but two category creating companies.

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Mark is a real legend in the space of GTM.

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First, he helped usher in the era

of marketing automation at Eloqua.

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Which later sold to Oracle, and he

then founded the Advocacy and Customer

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Engagement Platform in Fluidiv.

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So this is someone who knows a thing

or two about creating categories.

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Today, Mark is the CEO and Head

Coach at Category Knots, where he

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offers coaching to CEOs on category

design and company building.

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And Mark and I are going to chat

about what was it like building the

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category of marketing automation

back in the early days, and then

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just dive deep into his playbook for

category creation more generally.

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What does this mean?

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When should we do it?

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How is it done?

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Mark, I am so excited to

have you on the show today.

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I'm excited

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Mark Organ: too.

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Let's get

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Justin Norris: going.

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Alright.

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I mean, let's start at the beginning.

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Some inside perspective

on the days at Eloquo.

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What was it like?

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What was your idea in the

beginning founding that company?

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And how did it evolve into what we came

to know as, I think, the first marketing

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automation platform, if I'm not mistaken.

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Mark Organ: Yeah, I mean, the first one

to get any attention, the interesting

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thing is that there's nothing really

new under the sun and there actually

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was before Eloqua, there's at least

one company that I do recall, I can't

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remember the name of them, that built an

Eloqua like thing, but this was before

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the idea of multi tenant cloud databases.

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So this was on premise, They had to

sell their product for at least a

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quarter million dollars up front.

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So there's something to be said

for just having good timing.

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Often there's an enabling technology that

allows a disruptive technology to work.

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Like a good example is in the

automobile, which was actually

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around for a good 15 years before

it really started to take off.

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And it wasn't until the key

ignition, people had to stand

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outside and crank the car, if you

might have seen old videos of that.

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And that wasn't a very good experience

for a driver, but the combination of

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the key ignition pneumatic tires made a

big difference for the quality of drive.

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So sometimes you need that

enabling technology to work.

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And I think in the case of Eloqua and

other technologies like it, I mean,

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you can make a case for CRM as well,

really only taking off after the cloud.

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I had a bunch of other technologies,

but yes, I mean, the first one to

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really get to commercial scale, uh,

and it was a very interesting story.

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Eleco was a bootstrap company.

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I was the oldest person in the

company at the time at 25 when I

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founded the company and really,

we were just trying to survive.

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We raised 166, 000 and managed to

get profitable on that really was not

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thinking about creating a category at all.

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We're just trying to.

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Figure out a market is really

what we're trying to do.

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We're trying to figure out a market

and trying to do something that was

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different from what else was out there.

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The reason why we founded the company

had nothing to do with marketing at all.

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Interestingly, when we started it, and

this is something that not a lot of

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people know, but the idea really came

from the experiences that I and my

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partner, Steve Woods had when we were at

Bain companies, management consultants.

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I was doing work in the sales

effectiveness space and seeing how sales

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reps were really not being very effective.

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The advent of modern technology

allowed buyers to screen out

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sellers a lot more effectively.

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As it turned out, there was the rise

of the internet, and that's where a

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lot of new prospects were spending

time, either on websites or in

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email, this would be in the late 90s.

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At the same time, my partner Steve,

Who became the CTO of Eloqua.

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He was struggling to buy all

his Christmas presents online.

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He wanted to buy his

Christmas presents online.

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That was the challenge he

gave himself in:

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And couldn't really do it and

found it really needed advice and

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service in order to make it work.

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So he kind of put these ideas

together and said, What if we could

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use the internet to connect buyers

and sellers together on websites?

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That would be cool.

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And so what we actually created

was something that you now see

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in like intercom was like a chat.

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It was a chat product.

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And literally it was an embodiment of

this idea where we connected buyers

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and sellers using chat on the Internet.

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Our very first customer was our

commercial real estate agent.

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Um, it just turned out to

be completely lucky today.

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They would be known as

Cushman and Wakefield.

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It was like the number one

commercial real estate brokers.

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And I guess they took pity on

us and became our customer.

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After the tech rec in 2000.

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And so that was our first customer

that we launched this chat product.

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Justin Norris: Just to clarify, it sounds

like a very early version of drift.

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Yeah.

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So drift

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Mark Organ: or Olark or intercom.

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Yeah.

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I mean, if you were to look at the

screenshot, it really looks very similar.

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To those products.

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But what was interesting is our very

first customer was a B2B company.

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So everyone else in the space at the time.

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So the big player in the space,

which is still around, what we

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call live person was focused on the

consumer market like everyone else.

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And as it turned out, our first

customer was B2B and that was lucky.

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And so as it turns out, commercial

real estate sales reps that make

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hundreds of thousands of dollars a

year don't really want to chat with

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random prospects on the internet.

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But what they were interested in doing was

in following up with people when they were

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ready to talk about a particular property.

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So we actually built the email

engine because we thought, well,

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we're not getting a consistent

enough flow of chatters.

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So let's build an email so that

we can get more consistent flow.

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And then that actually ended up becoming

the MVP was really, it was an accident.

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And so it was a sort of combination

of email marketing and what actually

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was website tracking, putting those

two together and allowing sales reps

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to follow up with prospects in order.

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That became the MVP.

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It was an absolute accident.

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But what was interesting, though, is

that the foundational mission of the

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company, which is to connect sellers and

buyers over the internet, that was true.

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But the technology that we

used ended up being different.

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Like, we ended up jettisoning

the chat product after a while.

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And then even the email marketing and

website analytics, like, even though

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those two components Were a key part of

the technology that wasn't the category

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like the category was focused around

nurturing prospects until they were ready.

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To buy, so the fact that we were an email

marketing or website analytics, like those

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are not the markets that we played in.

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We actually created a new market

and it was pretty interesting

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because nobody would fund us.

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Right?

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So the VCs all turned us down, the

analyst firms refused to cover us and it's

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because they thought we were confused.

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So they thought we're like,

are you a web analytics player?

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We're like, well, no, I mean,

we have that technology, but

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that's not the market we play in.

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We're happy to have.

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Web trends at the time, website

story, which became omniture

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have that part of the market.

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Email marketing became a

huge market unto itself.

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Again, not really the market that

we wanted to play in selling emails

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at a quarter of a cent per piece.

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The emails we sent were

20 times more expensive.

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The reason why is it's not about email.

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The reason why it was about this other

sort of function that we created.

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And that really became the genesis

of what was a new category.

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Not just the way that the technology

was used, but probably most importantly,

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and probably get into it, the people who

used it, which are not really necessarily

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the sales reps, but these would be like

the early marketing automation people,

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marketing operations people that were

in charge of having a more efficient

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and productive marketing organization.

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You

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Justin Norris: alluded a bit to the

essence of what that motion was.

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Basically, the idea that people might

come to you doesn't necessarily mean

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that they're ready to buy, but if we

can continue to engage with them over

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a period of time, send them relevant

content, build that relationship, then

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when they are ready to buy, we can

be ready to hand them over to sales.

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Like, kind of very simplistic, but broadly

speaking, And actually also spoke to john

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miller from marketo about the genesis of

this and from his point of view it kind

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of emerged sort of almost organically

like hubspot was talking about something

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similar within by marketing marketo

was talking about something you were

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doing this thing was it just sort of

this organic thing that was in the air

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or do you remember the origin of this

idea of going to market in this way.

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Mark Organ: Yeah, no,

I do remember the idea.

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Yeah, and it's interesting because

we were founded more than six

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years before Marketo and HubSpot.

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I think to some degree, both of those

companies were a reaction to Eloqua.

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In fact, I saw the early VC deck that

Phil Fernandez and John Miller produced.

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And it had Eloqua in there, but

the challenge with Eloqua, which

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they correctly identified was that

the user experience was not great.

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And they improved on that.

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HubSpot also was a reaction to Eloqua

to some degree because it was to them

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all about interrupting buyers and

not actually providing the best buyer

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experience, which I'll get to in a bit.

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So I think buyer experience is really

important here and probably one of the big

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insights that I had, there's sort of two

foundational ideas that built up Eloqua.

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One was my insight on sellers, but the

other one was Steve Woods insight on

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buyers, that he wasn't able to have

the experience he wanted as a buyer.

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And I think there's a lot of.

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Insight in that that great marketing helps

buyers get the feelings that they want

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to get the experience that they wanted.

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So this idea was really quite central

when we founded the company again.

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Number 1 was that the Internet could be,

which includes email and the web could

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be a powerful tool for sellers to connect

to prospects when they're ready to buy.

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So that was an insight that we had

even when we started the company.

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And the second one is the

experience of buying is not great.

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And if we can improve it, then

you probably have a market there

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somewhere, even though the technology

that we built first was wrong, like

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it was not what the market wanted.

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We still had an insight that

came from our own experiences.

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And also in my case, I mean, interviewing

hundreds of sales reps as part

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of my consulting work so that our

brains were kind of primed for this.

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We knew the type of

problem we wanted to solve.

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Solve.

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We had an understanding of the data that

we would expect if we were solving it

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properly so that when our technology

was wrong and not just our technology

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was wrong, so is our target market.

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So we're based in Toronto and Toronto is

a big financial center in North America.

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And so our initial target was finance

insurance and real estate because that's

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what you have here in downtown Toronto.

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And it turns out that

market was wrong too.

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That's banks and insurance companies.

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They don't really care that much

about lead generation and demand gen

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because they have really tons and tons

of people that they could sell to.

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But most of them are not appropriate.

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They don't have the right kind

of credit score and whatnot.

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So that was off too.

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But again, I think because we had

a strong initial hypothesis as to

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what data we would expect to see if

things were going well, we changed

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the technology and we changed the

market so that we ended up tacking

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to a target market that actually was

desperate for High quality opportunities.

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In fact, that was the biggest

problem that they had.

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And maybe one of the ways that we got

this insight was that it turns out there's

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a part of the real estate market that

actually ended up being affected for us.

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So Cushman Wakefield was not

actually a great customer for us, and

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eventually they ended up churning.

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But we did end up getting pretty

lucky in that we had some customers

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in the vacation real estate space.

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It turns out we had a partner

in Toronto that was really

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big into vacation real estate.

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And that became a hit.

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So understanding, well, why did

that work and other real estate

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companies, for example, not work?

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And it turns out that vacation real

estate is different in that their

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real estate is more perishable.

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Like when they build something,

they have to sell it pretty quickly.

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Being able to sell out properties

allows them to raise more money on Wall

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Street and go and do the next project.

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And that's kind of more software like.

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So if you think about when you build

a piece of software, it is perishable.

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You need to sell like hell.

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And if you don't, there's

going to be competitors that

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are going to catch up to you.

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So that's when the light bulb kind

of went off and said, Oh, I get it.

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We need to sell to companies

that need qualified leads

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like their life depends on it.

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And those are the best opportunities.

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And then an even bigger lightbulb came up.

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Another random thing.

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As I said, I'm an ex scientist.

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Before I got in the business,

I was actually literally at

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the lab bench for eight years.

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I was going to get my PhD in neuroscience,

literally doing lab bench work, right?

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And if you look at the history of

discoveries, I mean, often they are

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accidents, but there's a prepared

mind, like a prepared mind We'll

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see the accident and see that.

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Oh, this thing could

make a good post it note.

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For example, like someone discovered a

glue that wasn't a very good glue, right?

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And said, Oh, this crappy glue

would actually be really good.

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And that's where the

post it notes came from.

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And so I think like a good

entrepreneur, their mind is always.

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They're in the market.

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They're talking to prospects and

customers and they're feeling it.

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And they're actually looking

potentially for adverse data.

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The adverse data may

actually be what you want.

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And so we got another interesting

customer called J boss, which at

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the time was one of the biggest open

source software companies in the world.

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It was our first open

source software customer.

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So this would be like 2004.

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So other companies at the

time would be like my sequel.

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You might remember them red hat.

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And I have a funny story about Red

Hat, which shows you what product

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market fit really looks like.

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But Jboss was a massive success for us.

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We generated 10 times better return

for them than we did for any of our

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other customers that we had before.

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So what went on there and

why was it so effective?

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Well, it turns out that open source

software companies are different

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from regular software companies

in that they already have all the

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leads that they could ever want.

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They're drowning in leads.

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They're using the damn thing for free.

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What you need to do is figure

out who's the best fit.

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And prioritize those for sales

reps in order to follow up

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with being able to do that.

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Absolutely transformed J Boston's

economics, and they ended up

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selling for a huge multiple.

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And so at that point, we got that

every other open source software

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company in the world actually became

our customer, including Red Hat.

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This is really funny because we

went down in North Carolina to go

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to go in and launch at Red Hat.

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And these poor people had to go

and buy like Windows terminals.

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To use our product because we're

like in a cathedral of open source

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with our Microsoft based product.

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It's like going to Mecca and

offering a pork sandwich.

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I mean, it's hilarious.

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That's what product market

fit really looks like.

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When someone has to buy a whole bunch

of computers just to use your product,

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you know you're doing something right.

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But then we really got it.

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Like we really got it.

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This is okay.

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What we're really good at is

this lead qualification thing

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and prioritization thing.

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That's what we absolutely nailed.

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And so from that point on, like

our growth went nuts because

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we knew exactly what we were.

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Why we did what we did, who the best

possible fits are for us, who the

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best partners are for us, what are the

best next products for us to build,

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because we really understood ourselves.

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And that's really because of our

interaction with the market and

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the data that we had coming back.

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And to me, this is what building

a software company or any

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company really is all about.

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It's about, there's a scientific method.

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You develop hypothesis as to what you

think is the right target market, the

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right offering for that market, the

right way to position it and market it.

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And then you go and get data coming back

and that tells you kind of where you

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should go and point your company at that

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Justin Norris: point.

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When you talk about the lead

prioritization use case, are we

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really talking about lead scoring?

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Like, was that the genesis of

what we call lead scoring today?

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It is.

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Mark Organ: That's exactly it.

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It was the genesis of lead scoring because

you needed to have a score in order

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to prioritize who to follow up with.

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And that really did come from

our foundational research

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that I did into Seller.

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So what I discovered when I was

Learning all about sellers is, number

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one, seller time is super valuable.

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It's way more valuable than most

companies really give it credit for.

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The second thing I learned is seller

longevity or tenure is super important.

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So salespeople really start

to pay off big in their third

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or fourth year with a company.

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That's some of the

research that I had done.

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So when a company is losing

their sales reps after two

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years, it's an absolute tragedy.

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And why do sales reps leave companies?

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Well, the other thing I found out

is they leave because they're not

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getting the leads that they require.

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It's not about their education.

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It's not about their management.

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A lot of really.

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And this was a kind of a blinding insight,

not just for me, but for my client at the

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time that lead quality was so important.

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So sales reps are wasting

time on poor quality leads.

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It is devastating.

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It feels like absolute crap

because they're not only are they

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not being successful, they're

wasting a lot of their time.

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So optimizing sales rep

time and efficiency was a

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huge focus for us at Eloqua.

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Which you think about it,

is super weird for a company

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that's in the marketing space.

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Like why is a marketing company

obsessed about sales rep productivity?

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It's because of where we came from.

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It's because of our origins.

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And I do think it's one of the

reasons why Eloquest succeeded.

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I think we succeeded because we

were focused on the right metrics

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and metrics that were completely

different from everybody else in the

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space because of who we were, that

we were the marketing company that

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was obsessed with sales success.

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In fact, a number of our customers, we

were told many times, this is the first

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time in two years where we've got together

with the sales organization again,

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like we'd have these meetings that had

marketing and sales together on the same.

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Table in order to discuss

what is a qualified lead.

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How do we score these properly?

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We would be the driver of

that conversation, especially

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in the earlier days.

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I mean, the later days at Eloqua, sure,

everyone started talking about this.

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You had serious decisions that

was bringing this to market.

359

:

Really, we were the first company to

ever partner with serious decisions.

360

:

This is another interesting

story in itself, in terms of

361

:

why we partnered with them.

362

:

But yeah, I think that one of the ways to

do well in the software industry, which

363

:

has got tons of noise, lots and lots

of players in it, Is to build processes

364

:

that have never been built before.

365

:

And those are most commonly

found when you bridge over

366

:

departments, you bridge function.

367

:

So Eloqua really was a bridge between the

sales function and the marketing function.

368

:

And Fluidiv, which came later, was a

bridge between the marketing function

369

:

and the customer success function.

370

:

So when you bridge across two functions,

which are often are your fault lines

371

:

in companies where you have departments

that don't talk very well together,

372

:

building processes that bridge those very

well and using technology to do that.

373

:

It's a great way to build a company that

374

:

Justin Norris: works.

375

:

What extent do you feel that the

platforms that you've built are

376

:

agnostic in the sense that they're

toolkits that can be used in a variety

377

:

of ways versus platforms that have

a kind of opinionated perspective

378

:

on go to market built into them?

379

:

So if we take the example of Eloqua, The

motion that sort of evolved around that

380

:

and I think evolved around the category of

marketing automation generally is the one

381

:

that we've kind of alluded to use content

to collect leads you nurture you score you

382

:

hand over to sales that was like the basic

scaffolding of that motion and do you

383

:

feel that is sort of centrally embedded.

384

:

In the platform and if that motion

changes is I think that there's

385

:

questions and that is evolving today.

386

:

Do those platforms need to evolve as well?

387

:

Or do you feel that they're more just

like, these are toolkits that we can

388

:

use in any way to market, however we

389

:

Mark Organ: want.

390

:

Yeah, that's a great question.

391

:

I think a great piece of

technology really does both.

392

:

If you're just a platform that can do

anything, users don't really know what

393

:

to do with all the power in the product.

394

:

If you don't have an opinionated way, at

least for some of the critical things.

395

:

If there's not an, what you call

opinionated, which I just think

396

:

is intellectual property that's

embedded in a piece of software.

397

:

If you don't have that, then

I think you're probably not

398

:

going to hit your potential.

399

:

I think we have both, where at least

for some key functions, there is

400

:

a best practice way to do things.

401

:

But there's also something for power

users that have innovated, like there

402

:

needs to be a way for innovators

to use your product as a canvas

403

:

to do what it is that they want.

404

:

And oftentimes those, I mean, I've

found it many times, both with Eloqua

405

:

and Includiv, that our customers

knew better than us what to do.

406

:

They would tell us,

well, here's our vision.

407

:

I remember DocuSign with their

150 different nurture streams,

408

:

which they could do in Aliqua,

you couldn't do it anywhere else.

409

:

We never conceived of anything like that.

410

:

That was something that they

said that they wanted to do.

411

:

And so we were able to push the

product into that direction.

412

:

I think what product managers

have to really think through,

413

:

and this is really difficult.

414

:

This is why product management, when you

get a good one, a good product manager,

415

:

a good CTO, they're worth their weight

in gold is you've got to figure out in

416

:

which directions do we need to scale.

417

:

You can't scale at every dimension.

418

:

At Eloqua, what we decided is we

want to be able to scale in the

419

:

direction of Basically allowing for

the most sophisticated marketing

420

:

campaigns ever to be created.

421

:

We want it to be for people who want an

ultimate power to be able to do that.

422

:

But there are a lot of

dimensions that we didn't scale.

423

:

You couldn't have an unlimited

number of sales reps, whatever.

424

:

You couldn't have a ton

of users on the product.

425

:

I think it would break.

426

:

You couldn't have.

427

:

5 million simultaneous

visitors on a website.

428

:

So if you wanted to go super

high scale B2C, it would break.

429

:

And we knew that we're not going

to try to go after those spaces.

430

:

I think the limit of where we went to,

which ended up being also an accident,

431

:

was a number of sports teams used the

product because we started in sort

432

:

of selling seasons tickets and then

move from there onto the B2C side.

433

:

But that was really straining

the product quite a lot.

434

:

So there's like B2C, we're

not going to go there.

435

:

Lots and lots of users.

436

:

We're not going to go there, but if

you have in mind a killer campaign

437

:

that you want to do, that has a huge

amount of sophistication to it, if

438

:

this happens, then just do this.

439

:

If this happens and do that, we want

to be able to nail that and it'd

440

:

be the best in the world at that.

441

:

And I think that was a good

decision that we went into.

442

:

Those are things, for example,

that Marketo or HubSpot could never

443

:

do, even today, could not do them.

444

:

They could do a lot of other

things, and maybe even including

445

:

things that Eloqua can't do.

446

:

Like, I think Marketo again made

a smart decision and said, We are

447

:

going to compete on ease of use.

448

:

And so there are going to be a lot

of Eloqua's potential customers that

449

:

are not going to need all that power.

450

:

And they're going to want to

make it more of a joy to use.

451

:

And I think they did a great job.

452

:

I give a lot of credit to John

and Phil for what they did there.

453

:

And then at HubSpot, I mean, they

weren't even really in the marketing

454

:

automation space in the beginning.

455

:

They were really inbound marketing.

456

:

Somehow they made marketing

automation inbound y.

457

:

I'm amazed at their ability to do that.

458

:

Because for years, Darmesh said,

we're not getting into that space.

459

:

We don't like it.

460

:

And then they did.

461

:

And somehow it worked, I guess,

as testaments to great marketing.

462

:

If you want to make it big in the

marketing software business, you

463

:

need to have platform potential.

464

:

You need to have the ability for people

to do things that you did not conceive of.

465

:

But you need to think about,

well, what direction is that going

466

:

to go in and can we own that?

467

:

And at the same time, you absolutely need

to be opinionated on some critical things.

468

:

Like you have to understand

the best way to do things.

469

:

And drive those best

practices for, for companies.

470

:

And to your question, I

mean, things are changing.

471

:

I do think that product

led growth is the future.

472

:

I just can't imagine that any

company is going to be purely

473

:

sales driven in the future.

474

:

If you're not using your product to do

more of the other functions, the sales,

475

:

the marketing, the customer success

functions, even the product functions.

476

:

If you're not doing that, then

you're going to lose to someone

477

:

who is going to do that well.

478

:

And I think the current marketing

automation tools today are

479

:

actually not that good at that.

480

:

They're really not evolved

for getting those deep product

481

:

signals that are in there.

482

:

And I think we're yet to see

who's going to win in that space.

483

:

I don't think it's going to be

484

:

Justin Norris: the existing players.

485

:

About how you had to pivot multiple

times start over the wrong market wrong

486

:

technology wrong product it's funny

because i am listening to audio book by

487

:

ben horowitz hard thing about hard things

and he talks about his experiences and

488

:

very similar they were selling servers

they were failing the pivoted to selling.

489

:

Software they almost died so many times

and then they had a big exit and same

490

:

for you selling to oracle for almost 900

million dollars and so do you feel that

491

:

these pivots and these sort of brushes

with death so to speak maybe that's a

492

:

bit too dramatic but just approaching

failure and then needing to reassess.

493

:

Is this just inherent in the journey

of entrepreneurship or are there

494

:

some people that just get it lucky

and they're like, yep, here we go.

495

:

And it's a smooth path to kind

of fame and fortune from there.

496

:

Mark Organ: You're not being overly

dramatic about brushes with death.

497

:

I mean, we came within four

days of kicking the bucket.

498

:

I mean, there's some crazy stories

of how we kept ourselves alive.

499

:

which included, which running was great

about that is that our employees owned

500

:

a lot of the company a lot more than

what was typical because we had a number

501

:

of brushes with death and we ended up

selling stock to the family members of our

502

:

employees and they ended up doing well.

503

:

So yeah, no, it was

definitely a hairy experience.

504

:

I think it's possible that there's

some people who just get lucky, but

505

:

I work with a lot of entrepreneurs

and a number of them have had to do.

506

:

Multiple like what you're talking

about really is the pivoting from

507

:

servers into software or whatnot.

508

:

I mean, that's a big pivot or so.

509

:

Maybe more of these mini pivots where

their target market is wrong, their

510

:

pricing model and offering is off.

511

:

That's a big one, right?

512

:

So that was a big one at included.

513

:

We went from a freemium model to

a paid pilot model, and that was

514

:

actually really big for getting our

growth going in the right direction.

515

:

So, yeah, business model

target market messaging.

516

:

Yeah.

517

:

That's why I advocate this sort of

scientific Agile approach where as a

518

:

CEO, you're constantly testing ideas.

519

:

You're constantly saying, what about this?

520

:

I wonder what would happen

if we charge this way?

521

:

What would happen if we

try this target market?

522

:

And you're doing it really as a

way to get closer to the answer.

523

:

And the answer being, this is our target

market with this offering, with this

524

:

pricing model, with this messaging,

that is going to be the answer for

525

:

winning a multi billion dollar market.

526

:

And so, being open to other

ideas that maybe your initial

527

:

hypothesis wasn't right.

528

:

In fact, it's almost sure to be wrong.

529

:

Your initial hypothesis

is sure to be wrong.

530

:

But, but then once you're starting to

learn, having increasing conviction in

531

:

how you're going to market over time.

532

:

Justin Norris: And then maybe that's

a good transition into the topic of

533

:

category building generally, because

you've made that the focus of your

534

:

current career with category knots,

which is a super interesting idea.

535

:

Maybe just as a first question, should

everybody try to build a category?

536

:

Is there times where like actually

don't build a category, do something

537

:

within an existing category?

538

:

How should people think about this?

539

:

Mark Organ: Building a

category is not for everybody.

540

:

It's funny.

541

:

I mean, the last time, uh, when I wanted

to start in fluid in my significant

542

:

other, why don't you just go and do it?

543

:

Marketo did.

544

:

Why build something completely new?

545

:

Cause that's why I'm wired.

546

:

It's just what I'm excited about doing.

547

:

I'm actually not a technologist.

548

:

I mean, a long time ago, but

God bless Eric Yuan and zoom.

549

:

They built a, an amazing product to.

550

:

Capture an existing category, but

he'll be the first to tell you they

551

:

had no interest in building a category.

552

:

You wanted to build a better mousetrap.

553

:

For the existing one and I think

that could be a fine way to go.

554

:

I think the people who are

excited about building categories.

555

:

It's just because that's the way they are.

556

:

They're pioneers.

557

:

It's the way that they're wired.

558

:

The 1 thing that I do really

love about building categories

559

:

is that while it takes longer.

560

:

I think if you follow a good step

by step process, you actually

561

:

can build something great.

562

:

It may not be a multi billion dollar

category, but I think if you do

563

:

it right, and you're the owner of

even a smaller category that's,

564

:

it's a 30 million category, but

you have 50 percent share in that.

565

:

I mean, you still have a business

that's doing 15 million in sales,

566

:

and it's probably profitable.

567

:

I actually have a friend

of mine who did just that.

568

:

He was a top sales rep at LinkedIn

and he was burnt out and his wife

569

:

was a permanent makeup artist.

570

:

Like they basically tattoo

makeup on women's faces.

571

:

I'm burnt out.

572

:

I'm going to help build their

business for a little while

573

:

while I figure out what's next.

574

:

And at the time I talked to him about my

playbook around how to build a category,

575

:

which he thought was really interesting.

576

:

And he's like, we'll

try some of your ideas.

577

:

And so at the time there was like a few

hundred permanent makeup artists in North

578

:

America and his wife was one of them.

579

:

So they started by just making kits.

580

:

These are like permanent makeup kits.

581

:

They just assembled a bunch

of stuff and ship them.

582

:

That's how they started.

583

:

They ended up building their own products.

584

:

So they source their own products.

585

:

They did training.

586

:

They did certification.

587

:

They ended up doing a award ceremony.

588

:

A lot of the things that I've done

in terms of category building.

589

:

Today it's actually a

pretty interesting business.

590

:

It's in the double digit millions.

591

:

They own a hundred percent of it.

592

:

They're probably doing a lot better than

many people in the software industry.

593

:

They could probably sell their business

to a private equity firm for like a lot.

594

:

And so it's not a huge category,

but they own it and that's not bad.

595

:

Yeah, it's taken them 10 years

and typically is how long it

596

:

takes to really build a category.

597

:

But the step by step process.

598

:

Actually makes it to me a little

bit less risky compared to trying to

599

:

catch lightning in a bottle, building

a new piece of technology for an

600

:

existing category to me actually feels

riskier and maybe it's just because

601

:

of my skill set around categories.

602

:

So let me tell you a little bit about

what that step by step process is.

603

:

It starts with having what I call

the underserved hero, which at

604

:

Eloqua was the demand gen marketer.

605

:

So we found these really interesting

people when we went out to go and

606

:

visit prospects, and these were

these marketers that often did not

607

:

even have a background in marketing.

608

:

A lot of them came out of engineering.

609

:

In fact, some of them came out of

sales, but basically what happened is

610

:

you had these companies where the CEO.

611

:

And other senior people figured

out that the Internet was the

612

:

way to go for marketing, like,

and making something more process

613

:

oriented was kind of the way to go.

614

:

And they often didn't have people

even in their own department

615

:

that were good at this.

616

:

They had to go and find other

people that were a little more

617

:

quantitative and process oriented.

618

:

And these were people that were

attracted to us, to our product.

619

:

And I mentioned serious decisions.

620

:

They're also very attracted

to serious decisions.

621

:

And their research at the time when

we partnered with them, they were four

622

:

people and a dog over top of a rented

storefront in Danbury, Connecticut.

623

:

They were absolutely tiny, but

these demand gen people really loved

624

:

research because they were the ones

that were doing research in this

625

:

area in terms of demand generation.

626

:

And the reason why we call ourselves

demand gen automation was because these

627

:

people call themselves demand generators.

628

:

They literally didn't even

call themselves marketers.

629

:

So we generate demand for a living.

630

:

Like we are the people that in a demand

poor environment, make it happen.

631

:

And so all we did at Aleppo was we

built a company around these people.

632

:

So we didn't just give them product.

633

:

We gave them services.

634

:

We gave them an ecosystem.

635

:

We gave them a conference, content, a

book, a platform to build on top of.

636

:

And we just surfed that wave.

637

:

And that's the same way that

Lucatina Davies served for

638

:

their permanent makeup company.

639

:

Who did they serve?

640

:

They serve these underserved heroes of

permanent makeup artists, which swelled

641

:

from 500 people to 5, 000 people.

642

:

Kind of surfed that wave.

643

:

At Influitive, there were customer

marketers at the time when we started

644

:

customer marketing was this really,

it was not really much of a thing.

645

:

Okay.

646

:

These are the people that were

in charge of getting references.

647

:

To help close deals.

648

:

And maybe they would do a

referral campaign now and again.

649

:

And what we saw was that this is going

to be huge because, well, because

650

:

we're driving everyone crazy with

these emails all the time, the buyers

651

:

were getting frustrated with that.

652

:

They wanted to hear from their peers.

653

:

They wanted to hear from real customers.

654

:

And as it turns out, getting customers

to talk to advocate was not that easy.

655

:

And so what we did is say, okay, well,

as opposed to having separate processes

656

:

for referrals and references and case

studies and five star reviews online and

657

:

all that, well, shouldn't you have one

person in charge of all customer evidence?

658

:

And let's go serve those people.

659

:

And that's all we did.

660

:

And we did the same playbook, which

is we gave them product, service,

661

:

ecosystem, community, award ceremony,

book and other content and platform.

662

:

And honestly, if you've chosen well,

if you've chosen people that are on

663

:

the way up, that's all you have to do,

is you just serve those people, and

664

:

eventually you'll actually have something

decent, and because you were the first.

665

:

You're going to get your share

of the winnings of that category.

666

:

And even if you don't choose well,

that's my whole point, like, let's

667

:

say the category doesn't end up

becoming that big as you thought.

668

:

You still might end up with 30 40

percent of something, and 30 or 40

669

:

percent of anything is actually still

670

:

Justin Norris: decent.

671

:

Did you find it?

672

:

Easier the second time around like coming

in doing in fluid if I really remember all

673

:

that vividly because I kind of remember

the first days of influence of and then

674

:

marketo had purple select and I knew

your team because I was also in Toronto

675

:

so I kind of was like on the periphery

of that a little bit watching it was it

676

:

easier or was it still just as hard and

require pivots and all that sort of thing.

677

:

It was

678

:

Mark Organ: easier.

679

:

So at Eloqua, I was completely rammed.

680

:

We had no idea what we were doing.

681

:

We made a lot more mistakes

than the second time.

682

:

And it was actually, I'm really grateful.

683

:

My credent at Salesforce, who asked me

to give a talk about category creation

684

:

in the early days of Influitive.

685

:

So that forced me to think about

what did we actually do at Eloqua?

686

:

And why did it work?

687

:

And then what are we

doing now at Influitive?

688

:

And that actually codified

a number of my ideas.

689

:

When I gave a talk at Dreamforce,

and so yes, there were less pivots.

690

:

I also raised more money, which

is both a blessing and a curse.

691

:

So Ellico was a bootstrap.

692

:

And in hindsight, there's

a lot of value in that.

693

:

At Influitive, I already

had a name for myself.

694

:

So I raised A lot, 30

plus million dollars.

695

:

And to be honest, not all that

money was invested wisely.

696

:

Once you raise that money, you have to go

and put it to work, but it did probably

697

:

make it easier to get to product market

fit, but the pivots were less severe.

698

:

We understood the target market.

699

:

While we sold to the same target

that we sold to at Eloqua, which were

700

:

sort of complex software companies.

701

:

So we understood that.

702

:

We did change the business model.

703

:

We did change the pricing models.

704

:

I mean, those things changed the

messaging, the messaging did go through

705

:

pivots, but we didn't go through such

like a huge product pivot, probably

706

:

what we did learn some of my big insight

that I had coming into Influitive came

707

:

from my experience where I was on the

board of a social gaming company and

708

:

seeing how interesting gaming companies

are compared to software companies.

709

:

You don't have to train

people on how to use a game.

710

:

They use it on their own and how

it really drives a lot of user.

711

:

Addiction.

712

:

And so one of the things that we did

learn is that the more fun and game like

713

:

we made the product, the better we did.

714

:

So we did go through a number

of interesting pivots to make

715

:

it more and more like a game.

716

:

But still the same process.

717

:

Like that was a hypothesis that we

had and then we went and tested it.

718

:

Let's predict what'll happen.

719

:

Let's see the data come out.

720

:

The data coming out says,

hey, this is really positive.

721

:

Let's go and double and

triple down on this idea.

722

:

Justin Norris: I'll give just

an homage like from an outside

723

:

perspective at that time your

marketing team was really top shelf.

724

:

Jim williams was your marketing

leader and alex shiplo who i know

725

:

pretty well was leading demand and

just seemed like you guys were on

726

:

fire like it was the hot place to be

people were closing you had really.

727

:

innovative ideas.

728

:

So it really did feel like at that

moment in time you had latched on

729

:

to something special and it was just

moving along at a really fast clip.

730

:

I don't know if it felt that

way internally as well, but it

731

:

certainly appeared that way.

732

:

Mark Organ: That was a really fun time.

733

:

We were at the time growing very quickly.

734

:

So that was the time we started

Advocamp, the Advocamp event, which

735

:

ended up being a big hit as well

with Jim Williams running that.

736

:

We hit a significant

rough patch after that.

737

:

And the churn started to really go up.

738

:

So while we were winning a lot of

customers and there was a lot of

739

:

excitement around the idea and still

is a lot of excitement around the idea.

740

:

The churn started to really go up.

741

:

One of the challenges was that so for

people who don't know on your show,

742

:

it was basically gamified community

and the purpose of the gamification

743

:

is to drive advocacy, so to get more

customers to invest their time and

744

:

energy and reputation into companies

that they really love with referrals,

745

:

references, case studies, videos.

746

:

Tweets and all those sorts of things.

747

:

So that's what the product was all about.

748

:

The insight for when to the product,

I mentioned a little bit about making

749

:

things fun and game like, but it's pretty

not a blinding insight, which is if

750

:

you make the process of advocating more

pleasurable, people will do more of it.

751

:

So make it more valuable, make

the experience better, which is

752

:

really what Influent is about.

753

:

So that was the first ever community

approach for doing advocacy.

754

:

The challenge was that this is a community

that lives separately from the product.

755

:

It wasn't that easy to get advocates

to do their thing like you really have

756

:

to build a good relationship with them.

757

:

So what we found is that there was

there a player customer marketers

758

:

out there and they got tremendous

return on investment for the product.

759

:

And then you had B and C grade customer

marketers, which are 70 percent of the

760

:

market, or 80 percent are B and C players.

761

:

And sometimes one of these people

would go on mat leave, or they'd

762

:

leave their job or whatnot, and

they'd get replaced with someone.

763

:

So even a community that

was going really well.

764

:

Would sometimes start

to crest a little bit.

765

:

And so the churn started to go up and

then the reputation for churn got out

766

:

into the market, which was not great.

767

:

So the company started to flatline

a little bit in terms of growth.

768

:

We had got ahead of our skis

in terms of our burn rate.

769

:

So I had to do a couple of

rounds of layoffs in order

770

:

to get things right sized.

771

:

Eventually I did end up leaving the

company to actually homeschool my son,

772

:

which was, that was sort of nine years

in, he was getting a little bit tired.

773

:

And then I think the company never

really, with the new management team,

774

:

didn't really hit its full potential.

775

:

So I still think it's a very

interesting category, and it will

776

:

be a multi billion dollar category.

777

:

The key is going to be

solving that churn problem.

778

:

And maybe AI is going to be

an important part of that.

779

:

I mean, that's generative AI was

not something that was part of the

780

:

experience before that's something

that could make a big difference.

781

:

I think that making the community a

more organic part of the experience

782

:

of using a product, I think could

make a big difference the same way

783

:

that in a Tesla, you have the referral

machine is built right into the car.

784

:

You don't have to think like, Oh,

you're happy with your experience.

785

:

Go refer a friend and we'll

give you something for that.

786

:

I like our conversation before about

enabling technology, the right enabling

787

:

technology, I believe will make this a

multi billion dollar category because

788

:

for sure the companies that get their

customers doing more of the work for

789

:

them, if your customers are doing

more of your selling, your marketing,

790

:

your product work, your customer

success work, you're going to win.

791

:

You have people who are better than your

people and they don't cost anything.

792

:

And so there's just no way that this

can't be a multi billion dollar category.

793

:

And I think we'll see that in the

next few years, someone is going

794

:

to go and build the category killer

795

:

Justin Norris: here.

796

:

It's funny that you mentioned gen AI,

because I think again, as an outside

797

:

server, one of the challenges I perceived.

798

:

In running an influential community,

the person labor required to like

799

:

keep it going, like new questions and

quizzes and challenges and things,

800

:

there was a constant stream of that.

801

:

It was relatively labor intensive and

AI could certainly relieve a lot of

802

:

that burden on the customer marketer.

803

:

Mark Organ: That's my hypothesis.

804

:

Yeah.

805

:

I think that generative AI may

turn those B players, custom

806

:

marketers into A players.

807

:

Maybe we're also getting things

like optimized scoring systems.

808

:

I think there's a lot of amazing

things that we could do with AI.

809

:

That could be the version of the

key ignition for this market space.

810

:

So for any entrepreneurs that are

listening, I think that there's a

811

:

very bright opportunity in the space.

812

:

Justin Norris: I want to ask one more

question about the sass market in general

813

:

and particularly the funding model

and this theme has emerged organically

814

:

and a lot of your responses about

bootstrapping Eloqua raised a lot of

815

:

money within fluid of your friends with

the permanent makeup business and how

816

:

they did it and I think over the last

year or so what we've seen with capital

817

:

markets drying up lots of layoffs.

818

:

A lot of companies that with these

insane valuations that will probably

819

:

never recover their initial value.

820

:

So even though they may have raised

hundreds of millions of dollars, those,

821

:

that equity is not very valuable.

822

:

All that is to say, do you think

that we're about to see different

823

:

models emerge that the traditional VC

model of like raise a whole bunch of

824

:

rounds, keep raising, keep burning?

825

:

Is that changing and is bootstrapping

going to become cooler or other

826

:

funding models become more popular?

827

:

Mark Organ: I think the answer is yes.

828

:

I think things are going to change.

829

:

I think the SAS, the industry is

maturing and there's still lots of

830

:

opportunity in a maturing space.

831

:

It's just, you're just not going

to see as much innovation around

832

:

sort of new functions to automate.

833

:

I think almost every function in a company

is now got some automation around it.

834

:

So that gold rush is

over, but then there are.

835

:

Opportunities and things

that are maturing.

836

:

There's a ways to put different functions

together that haven't been done before.

837

:

There are suites of software that you can

put together and you can integrate them

838

:

in ways that haven't been done before

that I think are going to be interesting.

839

:

I think there's more opportunity

now in bootstrapping than erasing.

840

:

Today.

841

:

So if I were to build another software

company today, well, first of all,

842

:

this, the cost has gone down so much.

843

:

I mean, if you could scrape together

a hundred thousand dollars today, you

844

:

can build a pretty decent product, get

it to market, test it with thousands

845

:

of different potential customers.

846

:

That would have taken 5 million when

I started Eloqua now, and now it

847

:

would cost a hundred thousand dollars.

848

:

And that's with a lot of

inflation at the same time.

849

:

I think that there's.

850

:

An opportunity really to raise

now when like we did it out.

851

:

I mean, the reason why I raised

money, I mean, really for two reasons.

852

:

One was we had a bunch of idiots

on our board that we have to get

853

:

rid of these angel investors that

were actually pretty terrible.

854

:

Um, they had to buy them out,

but the other one was we actually

855

:

knew what we were doing, right?

856

:

So we like, holy cow, we have

a market that's accelerating.

857

:

We can put revenue generating units

together at a profit in five months.

858

:

Two sales reps, a lead generator and

a half a sales engineer, and we can

859

:

make them profitable in five months.

860

:

Why wouldn't we raise all the money?

861

:

We can't in hindsight, like that's

really the right thing to do.

862

:

Because we could tell the investors,

like, you put your money, here's the

863

:

box, and here's what we're going to

do with it, and where are you going

864

:

to get return on the way back out?

865

:

Whereas at Influitive, honestly,

they were taking more risk, which

866

:

they were willing to do, because

they're like, well, Mark will figure

867

:

it out, because he's done it before.

868

:

And we were also taking a lot more risk.

869

:

And in hindsight, I'm like, I'm not

sure that was a really good idea.

870

:

Again, maybe one of the advantages

of being a category creator is

871

:

you actually do have more time.

872

:

We didn't have all competitors

breathing down our neck.

873

:

We had no competitors at all.

874

:

So I think we actually had more time.

875

:

Maybe in my case, I was just like,

well, they're throwing money at me

876

:

and the valuation is really high and

I'm kind of sick of writing checks.

877

:

And so sure, why not?

878

:

Let's take some money and

make life a little easier.

879

:

I can afford a vacation this year

and some other things like that.

880

:

If you can keep 100 percent or maybe 80

percent of your company, because you give

881

:

more, give more equity to your people.

882

:

Keep 80%, keep 70 percent

of the equity for yourself,

883

:

give more out to your people.

884

:

And then once you figure things out, well,

then you really do need, I mean, the scale

885

:

of go to market, you really do need money.

886

:

Now, especially if you actually have

competitors, you may lose the market.

887

:

That's the other reason why we had to

raise Elk at the time was that I started

888

:

to sense new competitors were coming.

889

:

I was right, right?

890

:

Marquetta was founded a year later

after we raised 10 HubSpot and these

891

:

companies in Silicon Valley would,

that's what they're good at doing.

892

:

They're good at raising

money and putting it to work.

893

:

Like I thought they were

bananas at Marquetta.

894

:

I'm like, I can't believe

they're doing this.

895

:

Why are they overpaying so much?

896

:

Well, actually they were right.

897

:

It was the right thing to do.

898

:

So yeah, no, I do think

we'll see a different model.

899

:

I think we'll see more bootstrapping.

900

:

I think we'll see more

intelligent use of debt.

901

:

As a way to get companies to a level

to where it makes sense to raise more

902

:

money at a higher valuation and invest

in nailing the go to market motion.

903

:

So

904

:

Justin Norris: interesting, Mark.

905

:

I really appreciate you chatting

with me, hearing this all.

906

:

It's just interesting to put into

perspective a lot of things that like I

907

:

saw this much of and your point of view.

908

:

Living through that.

909

:

Thanks, and I really hope

to chat with you again.

910

:

Thank you,

911

:

Mark Organ: appreciate it.

912

:

Have a great day.

913

:

Justin Norris: Hey everyone, I want to

invite you over to the RebOpsFM Substack

914

:

community, where you can sign up to get

rough transcripts, show notes, longer

915

:

form articles, and other bonus content.

916

:

Just head over to rebops.

917

:

fm slash subscribe to get free access.

918

:

I'd also love to know what you thought

of the episode, and to hear suggestions

919

:

for topics you want to learn about.

920

:

Feel free to leave a comment on Substack.

921

:

Or send me an email at justinatrevops.

922

:

fm.

923

:

Thanks for listening.

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About the Podcast

RevOps FM
Thinking out loud about RevOps and go-to-market strategy.
This podcast is your weekly masterclass on becoming a better revenue operator. We challenge conventional wisdom and dig into what actually works for building predictable revenue at scale.

For show notes and extra resources, visit https://revops.fm/show

Key topics include: marketing technology, sales technology, marketing operations, sales operations, process optimization, team structure, planning, reporting, forecasting, workflow automation, and GTM strategy.

About your host

Profile picture for Justin Norris

Justin Norris

Justin has over 15 years as a marketing, operations, and GTM professional.

He's worked almost exclusively at startups, including a successful exit. As an operations consultant, he's been a trusted partner to numerous SaaS "unicorns" and Fortune 500s.