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How to Build a SaaS Unicorn: The Outreach Story

93 points by tomhuntio 7y ago

cal97g 7y ago
How did outreach.io know which company I'm from, seemingly from IP address alone? We have no IP allocations, only domain names and DNS records.
jakozaur 7y ago
Congratulations! Some key take aways: 1. Postpone investment in marketing for the first few years and focus on the product. No need to spend time on social media. 2. Bid on competitors brand names in Google Ads. 3. When you buy other SaaS, give them testimonials with back links to boost your SEO.
- tomhuntio 7y ago
  A fantastic short summary, thanks so much for pulling these out Jakozaur :)
- troydavis 7y ago
  The article omits arguably the highest-impact element: 4. Be comfortable selling a product that almost all customers use to send spam to strangers. That's the ingredient many, hopefully most, entrepreneurs don't have. Outreach got popular by letting salespeople send the same template to more strangers, faster. That was its whole business for the first few years. Even today, the leftovers exist on their Web site. https://support.outreach.io/hc/en-us/articles/216288348-Avoiding-Spam-Filters https://support.outreach.io/hc/en-us/articles/216288348-Avoi... is one example: "When using Outreach, it is up to the individual to follow these requirements. Remember, being marked as spam can have a detrimental impact on your organization's deliverability rates." If there's a universal lesson, it might be to find a market, customer, or delivery method that you are uniquely suited for. Outreach's founders cared less than average about enforcing policies or making a positive overall impact, and they found a field where caring about paying customers at the expense of all other stakeholders (like recipients) was rewarded. While I sure wouldn't encourage differentiating that way, the concept works.
  - creaghpatr 7y ago
    >Outreach's founders cared less than average about enforcing policies or making a positive overall impact Didn't realize you were privy to the founders' nefarious intentions, do you have evidence to back this claim up? That's a huge story if you're telling the truth.
    - troydavis 7y ago
      There’s nothing nefarious about it. These are 2 of many relative priorities. For example, at one extreme, some people care only about impact and don’t care at all about money; that usually leads to a not-for-profit. At the other extreme is barely-legal greyhat malware/adware, where a lot of collateral damage is accepted as long as it’s profitable. I wouldn’t personally be comfortable with the tradeoffs that Outreach made, but it’s legal and making them doesn’t make them evil. One might describe it as greedy. (I don’t think greed is newsworthy and I’m far from the only person to see it here. Regarding evidence of Outreach’s spot on the continuum, https://twitter.com/annepmitchell/status/671386007850192896 https://twitter.com/annepmitchell/status/671386007850192896, https://twitter.com/dswiese/status/713039678287405056 https://twitter.com/dswiese/status/713039678287405056, and https://twitter.com/troyd/status/753721604081799168 https://twitter.com/troyd/status/753721604081799168 are 3 of many examples.)
      - lmeyerov 7y ago
        Making legal trade-offs can be evil, and setting & enforcing social norms is a basic responsibility of every adult.
    - mdorazio 7y ago
      Per another commenter's link in here, [1] shows pretty clearly what kind of person the founder is. I don't think there's much ground to stand on if you want to actually argue that the initial product wasn't designed explicitly to enable spamming sales prospects. [1] https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/11/26/20930374/nathan-latka-podcast-saas-data-top-entrepreneurs https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/11/26/20930374/nathan-latka-...
- whoisnnamdi 7y ago
  Another point - a version of "do things that don't scale", sign up your first 100 customers door-to-door I'm guessing this advice shouldn't be taken completely literally, but rather, the point is that one shouldn't fear signing up your first 100 customers in an unscalable, high-touch way. In fact, he seems to argue that by doing it this way you are more likely to get real, raw, and candid feedback from those users
qwertzy 7y ago
Not to be dramatic, but it would be nice if this domain/"enterprise" were not allowed here based on the reporting from Vox[0]. [0] - https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/11/26/20930374/nathan-latka-podcast-saas-data-top-entrepreneurs https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/11/26/20930374/nathan-latka-...
- jjeaff 7y ago
  After reading that article, I have got to say that it's so ironic that many of these SV founders are mad that Latka is selling their company data. One actually said when I provided that information for the podcast, "I didn't intend for that data to be sold." Latka's argument is that he is clear in the podcast and many other places that is what he does. It sounds like he is playing startup founders with their own game. Provide a service that the founder/company wants for free or little cost. Then turn around and sell their data to 3rd parties. I would be willing to bet that is the business model of many of the companies that have appeared on the podcast and are mad at having their data packaged and sold. And Latka's response is the same as all the founders of those types of companies. "It's in the fine print, bro!"
  - anon1m0us 7y ago
    What's good for the goose is good for the gander. Here is a human person doing to corporate persons what they have been doing to human persons. It drives a stake in the heart of their hypocrisy. They take your private info and sell it for marketing and he takes their marketing and sells their private info. The desire for HN'ers to silence this publication of private data speaks to the nature of the community being blind to their own wrongs.
- mfrye0 7y ago
  You beat me to it. I was going to share this too. I believe Michael Seibel had some choice words on Twitter last week about this guy. If you want to see one of the interviews, the one from Workato is particularly memorable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cg8q6RqpefM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cg8q6RqpefM. The founder couldn't handle the pressure.
- 7y ago

93 points by tomhuntio 7y ago

How did outreach.io know which company I'm from, seemingly from IP address alone? We have no IP allocations, only domain names and DNS records.

jakozaur 7y ago

Congratulations! Some key take aways: 1. Postpone investment in marketing for the first few years and focus on the product. No need to spend time on social media. 2. Bid on competitors brand names in Google Ads. 3. When you buy other SaaS, give them testimonials with back links to boost your SEO.

tomhuntio 7y ago
A fantastic short summary, thanks so much for pulling these out Jakozaur :)
troydavis 7y ago
The article omits arguably the highest-impact element: 4. Be comfortable selling a product that almost all customers use to send spam to strangers. That's the ingredient many, hopefully most, entrepreneurs don't have. Outreach got popular by letting salespeople send the same template to more strangers, faster. That was its whole business for the first few years. Even today, the leftovers exist on their Web site. https://support.outreach.io/hc/en-us/articles/216288348-Avoiding-Spam-Filters https://support.outreach.io/hc/en-us/articles/216288348-Avoi... is one example: "When using Outreach, it is up to the individual to follow these requirements. Remember, being marked as spam can have a detrimental impact on your organization's deliverability rates." If there's a universal lesson, it might be to find a market, customer, or delivery method that you are uniquely suited for. Outreach's founders cared less than average about enforcing policies or making a positive overall impact, and they found a field where caring about paying customers at the expense of all other stakeholders (like recipients) was rewarded. While I sure wouldn't encourage differentiating that way, the concept works.
- creaghpatr 7y ago
  >Outreach's founders cared less than average about enforcing policies or making a positive overall impact Didn't realize you were privy to the founders' nefarious intentions, do you have evidence to back this claim up? That's a huge story if you're telling the truth.
  - troydavis 7y ago
    There’s nothing nefarious about it. These are 2 of many relative priorities. For example, at one extreme, some people care only about impact and don’t care at all about money; that usually leads to a not-for-profit. At the other extreme is barely-legal greyhat malware/adware, where a lot of collateral damage is accepted as long as it’s profitable. I wouldn’t personally be comfortable with the tradeoffs that Outreach made, but it’s legal and making them doesn’t make them evil. One might describe it as greedy. (I don’t think greed is newsworthy and I’m far from the only person to see it here. Regarding evidence of Outreach’s spot on the continuum, https://twitter.com/annepmitchell/status/671386007850192896 https://twitter.com/annepmitchell/status/671386007850192896, https://twitter.com/dswiese/status/713039678287405056 https://twitter.com/dswiese/status/713039678287405056, and https://twitter.com/troyd/status/753721604081799168 https://twitter.com/troyd/status/753721604081799168 are 3 of many examples.)
    - lmeyerov 7y ago
      Making legal trade-offs can be evil, and setting & enforcing social norms is a basic responsibility of every adult.
  - mdorazio 7y ago
    Per another commenter's link in here, [1] shows pretty clearly what kind of person the founder is. I don't think there's much ground to stand on if you want to actually argue that the initial product wasn't designed explicitly to enable spamming sales prospects. [1] https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/11/26/20930374/nathan-latka-podcast-saas-data-top-entrepreneurs https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/11/26/20930374/nathan-latka-...
whoisnnamdi 7y ago
Another point - a version of "do things that don't scale", sign up your first 100 customers door-to-door I'm guessing this advice shouldn't be taken completely literally, but rather, the point is that one shouldn't fear signing up your first 100 customers in an unscalable, high-touch way. In fact, he seems to argue that by doing it this way you are more likely to get real, raw, and candid feedback from those users

qwertzy 7y ago

Not to be dramatic, but it would be nice if this domain/"enterprise" were not allowed here based on the reporting from Vox[0]. [0] - https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/11/26/20930374/nathan-latka-podcast-saas-data-top-entrepreneurs https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/11/26/20930374/nathan-latka-...

jjeaff 7y ago
After reading that article, I have got to say that it's so ironic that many of these SV founders are mad that Latka is selling their company data. One actually said when I provided that information for the podcast, "I didn't intend for that data to be sold." Latka's argument is that he is clear in the podcast and many other places that is what he does. It sounds like he is playing startup founders with their own game. Provide a service that the founder/company wants for free or little cost. Then turn around and sell their data to 3rd parties. I would be willing to bet that is the business model of many of the companies that have appeared on the podcast and are mad at having their data packaged and sold. And Latka's response is the same as all the founders of those types of companies. "It's in the fine print, bro!"
- anon1m0us 7y ago
  What's good for the goose is good for the gander. Here is a human person doing to corporate persons what they have been doing to human persons. It drives a stake in the heart of their hypocrisy. They take your private info and sell it for marketing and he takes their marketing and sells their private info. The desire for HN'ers to silence this publication of private data speaks to the nature of the community being blind to their own wrongs.
mfrye0 7y ago
You beat me to it. I was going to share this too. I believe Michael Seibel had some choice words on Twitter last week about this guy. If you want to see one of the interviews, the one from Workato is particularly memorable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cg8q6RqpefM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cg8q6RqpefM. The founder couldn't handle the pressure.
7y ago