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Growth Stacking Show with Dan Martell

Dan Martell is a Canadian serial entrepreneur and angel investor. Subscribe now and learn his best strategies to build and scale successful products and businesses. Now hit that button and start the show. It's FREE.
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Now displaying: March, 2018
Mar 26, 2018

WATCH: $100M+ ARR in 7 Years With Jason Cohen (Founder of WPEngine.com) - https://www.danmartell.com/jasoncohenvideo

Few things can shatter a founder’s confidence quicker than a poorly managed board meeting.

At best…

… you’ll get glossed over stares and “checked out” investors who secretly hate you for wasting their time.

At worst…

… you’ll accidentally knock over the first domino in getting kicked out of your own company.

Pay special attention to Step #4 in this week’s video to make sure that never happens.

After dozens of successful board meetings for my own software companies, as well as helping hundreds of SaaS Academy clients run their own…

... I’ve distilled it down to 5 key steps that impress even the most impatient and demanding board members, while getting you the support and buy-in you need to continue growing your company.

I break down the 5 steps in this week’s video.

At a high level, here’s the flow you should be using to run effective and highly productive board meetings:

  1. Big Picture
  2. Calibrate
  3. Company Building
  4. Working Sessions
  5. Close the Session

If you implement this flow while asserting yourself as a LEADER, I can guarantee you that you’ll never have another sweaty palmed or unproductive board meeting again.

Better yet, you’ll be able to put your investors to work instead of feeling like you’re constantly trying to impress them.

At the end of the day, your investors will thank you for it — and be excited to help you keep growing.

Give it a watch here and then drop a comment letting the community know what tips or tricks have proven successful in your own board meetings.

--

Dan Martell has advised more startups than his hometown has people and teaches startup founders like you how to scale. (Get the free 3 videos to grow your business here.) He previously created, raised venture funding for and successfully exited two tech startups: Flowtown and Clarity.fm. You should follow him on twitter@danmartell for tweets that are actually awesome.

Are you an entrepreneur? Get free weekly video training here:
http://www.danmartell.com/newsletter

+ Instagram (behind the scenes): http://instagram.com/danmartell
+ Facebook (live trainings + Q&A): http://FB.com/DanMartell
+ Twitter (what I'm reading): http://twitter.com/danmartell

Mar 19, 2018

DOWNLOAD: Referral System Page Worksheet - https://www.danmartell.com/referralworksheet

“Help me. Help you.”

Nope…

Not talking about that epic one liner from Jerry Maguire.

I’m talking about the inner dialogue your customers experience whenever they try to refer your product to their tribe.

One of the EASIEST ways to acquire a new B2B Saas customer is to have your current users refer you at scale.

Just ask Dropbox ;-)

Only problem is… most companies make that process painfully hard and complicated.

And since not having a simple and effective referral strategy is such a crazy missed opportunity to grow your user base while creating an army of evangelists…

I shot a new video showing you the 4 steps to creating a referral system that acts as a win-win-win…

…  for your current customers… your new customers… and your company.

On a high level, here’s what it takes to implement an effective B2B SaaS referral system:

  1. Choose a win
  2. Give to both
  3. Make it easy
  4. Seed it

Of the four, the first one is where most SaaS companies mess up.

Put it this way… if you were a restaurant owner, would people be more likely to refer you:

a) After they’ve booked a reservation
b) While waiting in line
c) When the waiter brings out the food
d) After they’ve eaten… and are waiting for the check.

Same goes for your SaaS.

Make the ask after a nice juicy win… and you’ll be well on your way to implementing a winning referral strategy that exponentially grows your user base without sucking air out of your acquisition margins.

Watch the full video to go deeper into the other steps.

--

Dan Martell has advised more startups than his hometown has people and teaches startup founders like you how to scale. (Get the free 3 videos to grow your business here.) He previously created, raised venture funding for and successfully exited two tech startups: Flowtown and Clarity.fm. You should follow him on twitter@danmartell for tweets that are actually awesome.

Are you an entrepreneur? Get free weekly video training here:
http://www.danmartell.com/newsletter

+ Instagram (behind the scenes): http://instagram.com/danmartell
+ Facebook (live trainings + Q&A): http://FB.com/DanMartell
+ Twitter (what I'm reading): http://twitter.com/danmartell

Mar 12, 2018

DOWNLOAD: Idea to Exit Mini-Course - http://www.ideatoexitonline.com/prototyping

“You’re not suppose to succeed!”

“The numbers are against you from day one.”

Those were the words hurled at me across the board room from one of my mentors.

Encouraging, right?

Up until that point I had so much confidence that failure wasn’t an option.

But the truth is – and you hear it all the time – most startups fail.

His words set me down a path of learning and implementing strategies to help protect me, my stakeholders, and my coaching clients  from the 5 highest leading causes of startup death.

Over the years, I’ve had the chance to see the inner workings of 1000+ companies.

I’ve listened to the intimate, behind-the-scenes details and decisions from the founders behind them.  

After seeing what works, what doesn’t, and what gives you a one-way ticket to the SaaS graveyard…

I’ve distilled those lessons into the big five for this week’s video.

When I sit back and look at my failures and those of my friends, I believe they can be traced back to one or more of these.

  1. Market Problems
  2. Business Model Failure
  3. Poor Management Team
  4. Running out of Cash
  5. Product Problems

What’s hilarious, and part of #3, is the amount of companies that fail due to co-founder in-fighting…

… meaning they couldn’t see eye to eye on a critical part of the business (funding, product roadmap, market strategy, etc).

The one I see the most often when it comes to technology and innovation is #1…

… founders running around with some cool tech, with no clear customer problem to solve.

It’s a solution in search of a problem.

Always a scary proposition and the opposite of the way I encourage first time founders to start off (find customers before you develop your tech).

If you’ve got questions about either one of these five, be sure to leave a comment with the specifics and I’ll help you turn things around.

Keep up the hustle!

--

Dan Martell has advised more startups than his hometown has people and teaches startup founders like you how to scale. (Get the free 3 videos to grow your business here.) He previously created, raised venture funding for and successfully exited two tech startups: Flowtown and Clarity.fm. You should follow him on twitter@danmartell for tweets that are actually awesome.

Are you an entrepreneur? Get free weekly video training here:
http://www.danmartell.com/newsletter

+ Instagram (behind the scenes): http://instagram.com/danmartell
+ Facebook (live trainings + Q&A): http://FB.com/DanMartell
+ Twitter (what I'm reading): http://twitter.com/danmartell

Mar 5, 2018

DOWNLOAD: Rocket Demo Builder - https://www.danmartell.com/rocketdemo

Are you acting like a 5 year old when demoing your product?

Last week my son Max (5) asked me to help him with his show & tell presentation.

So I taught him a simple 3 step process.

  1. Start with the problem. (Story)
  2. Pick 3 benefits & features to highlight (Demo)
  3. Ask if they want to play afterwards (CTA)

These 3 steps are just a compressed version of what I teach my SaaS coaching clients… focus on the pain, peg it to benefits delivered via features and go for the close.

What do you think the other kids did?

They just went up and showed their toy, awkwardly rambled on about the things it could do, then sat down.

Almost makes you wanna cringe, right? Thing is…

Most SaaS Founders act like 5 year olds doing show & tell when they demo.

It’s not a product tour you’re doing… it’s a sales demo. You need to connect the dots for your customers in less than 30 minutes.

If you’re frustrated with low sales conversion numbers from your demos, or the amount of time it takes to close deals, then you’ll want to watch this week’s video where I share my 5 step process for crushing your sales quotas by demoing like a boss.

No mindless rambling about all the “cool” things your product does.

No tumbleweed silences that you awkwardly break up with a classic “oh, did I show you it can also do X?

Just a clear, efficient, value-driven exchange that sets up the sale without eating into anyone’s lunch plans.

Maybe you already have your demo setup so that it’s short & concise, but are you following these other 5 steps?

  1. Demo not tour
  2. Connect to pain
  3. Lead by question
  4. Peg the money shot
  5. Virtual close

The last one is the key to ensuring you reduce your sales cycles by future pacing the process with your prospect so they can get in the mindset of having bought.

Also, small tip – use BAMFAM in your demos.

Book a meeting from a meeting.

Never hang up the phone from a sales demo without agreeing upon a specific next step, ideally a call to review any questions that might come up, or to loop in other people on their team to define a proof of concept.

To help you crush your demo script, I’ve outlined a 9 box model called the Rocket Demo Builder that you can use to design your specific demo and get started closing more deals faster.

So what’s your favourite closing question? Post it as a comment and I’ll be sure to add a few others that I love using to get customers to say yes on the spot!

Have an amazing day!

--

Dan Martell has advised more startups than his hometown has people and teaches startup founders like you how to scale. (Get the free 3 videos to grow your business here.) He previously created, raised venture funding for and successfully exited two tech startups: Flowtown and Clarity.fm. You should follow him on twitter@danmartell for tweets that are actually awesome.

Are you an entrepreneur? Get free weekly video training here:
http://www.danmartell.com/newsletter

+ Instagram (behind the scenes): http://instagram.com/danmartell
+ Facebook (live trainings + Q&A): http://FB.com/DanMartell
+ Twitter (what I'm reading): http://twitter.com/danmartell

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