How to Go Up Market With Your SaaS

About this video

Dan explains how to move upmarket in a B2B software business without falling flat, drawing on coaching founders and a conversation with Mark Roberge, author of The Sales Acceleration Formula. Founders are often pulled upmarket by a larger customer, or raise money and hire salespeople, without considering the impact on go-to-market, product demands, compliance, security and integrations. His five-step process starts with GTM metrics for each segment: percentage of annual recurring revenue, CAC payback period, and percentage logo churn — if a segment has little ARR, a long payback and high churn, you lack go-to-market fit and should baseline those numbers before moving. Next, segment the map on a three-by-three grid of inbound, outbound and partners against small, medium and large, marking each square red, yellow or green to communicate focus. Then do a triple review of game tape — a real sales call reviewed by sales, product and marketing leads — capture fixes from all three perspectives, and lock those repeatable patterns into a segment-specific playbook, because the sales motion for inbound SMB differs from inbound mid-market or enterprise.

Key takeaways

• Do not move upmarket until you know per-segment GTM metrics: share of ARR, CAC payback period, and logo churn percentage
• Product-market fit is not enough — the talk centres on achieving go-to-market fit for the new segment
• Map segments in a 3x3 grid — inbound/outbound/partners by small/medium/large — and label each red, yellow or green so the whole team knows the focus
• Run triple reviews: sales, product and marketing together listen to a real call, with the rep prepping two to three strengths and two to three weaknesses
• Capture fixes from the review and lock them into a distinct playbook for that segment rather than reusing the SMB sales motion

Episode details: published June 22, 2020 · 11:21 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. Business results and any income figures mentioned are Dan Martell’s own claims, shared for education — they are not typical or guaranteed.

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