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There’s a dirty secret in Silicon Valley - we make money when you don’t show up.
I spoke with John McCauley, CFO of Calendly, who, after scaling companies in the Enterprise SaaS world, now leads one of the most recognizable PLG powerhouses. He observed the differences between the two worlds:
“I think the not-so-dirty little secret of SaaS at enterprise companies is we make money in the same way that the gym does. We make a lot of money off people that don't show up.
You don't get that luxury in PLG. They're constantly auditing their users and making sure that people are actually using it. And so I find it to be the purest form of software where you're only getting paid if you create value.
Where at Enterprise, that can be dubious at times, but at PLG, you’ve got to show up every day for work and prove that value to your customers.”
Yup. He said the quiet thing out loud.
And this realization isn’t lost on CFOs in charge of purchasing decisions.
Product Led Growth, for better or worse, trained CFOs to push for the following when evaluating a buying decision:
Get me to value fast, and preferably before I buy
Make it easy for me to buy more (or less)
Show me clear value, on a regular basis
These asks play out in de-risked buying decisions, clear ROI, and shorter contracts. It’s a brave new world.
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