In my experience the reality of enterprise purchasing is far more depressing. If you are a new company with a new product, hoping to sell into the large enterp

In my experience the reality of enterprise purchasing is far more depressing. If you are a new company with a new product, hoping to sell into the large enterprise market, you're competing with large, well-funded sales teams who's most compelling pitch is that "we're the safe choice." It may not be (and usually isn't) the best or most cost-effective choice. Yet at the end of the day, divisions or agencies making 7+ figure purchases want to feel confident in their purchase. "SAP is a good purchase because Ford/AT&T/Apple (I'm making these up) purchased them and they must know what they're doing." Enterprise sales is a very tough business. If I were launching a product, I'd probably target small teams first with a lower price-point to bypass the politics and get almost instant purchase approval. There the stakes are lower. Sure, you won't close a $500,000 sale in one fell swoop, but once you establish yourself across a number of teams, you can always change your product lineup and create an enterprise package that has a much higher cost. Obviously a large number of SaaS companies already do this and I have to believe it's the most effective route.