Well Done
You probably didn’t think you could do it: creating your own SaaS platform and company. But you did. Whether you undertook the journey alone or worked side-by-side with a business partner or two, you’ve successfully built and launched a SaaS product. You’ve landed customers who saw the value in your product and chose to be part of its early years. And, you’ve lost some customers — a perfectly normal process and part of doing business.
But throughout it all, you’ve grown. You’ve secured new subscribers, maintained relationships with current subscribers, refined your product with new features and functionality, and maybe built up a small but dedicated team. It wasn’t easy, it probably demanded a few (or more) sacrifices, and it may have even kept you up at night.
But you’ve made it. You have a solid product, happy customers, reliable MRR, and a good team. Congratulations. We know it was a difficult journey, but we also know it’s probably one you’d do all over again if given the chance — and you will. While you might not be starting from scratch, you’ll be entering a new phase: scaling your SaaS for the next level of growth.
Scaling SaaS Through Recruitment
The makeup and experience of your team are important in supporting SaaS scaling efforts. As a debt financing lender, one of the most common goals of obtaining non-dilutive working capital we’ve experienced with our clients is recruitment.
Your current team has gotten you this far, but maybe the limits of their combined skill set have been reached, and some new development talent is required. Maybe you want to add a sales manager or executive with SaaS experience to the team. Or maybe there’s another visionary recruit you’ve had your eye on. However, you might not have the capital you need to hire someone with extensive experience.
Professionals who understand SaaS, have built successful platforms before, or have the skills needed to push your development or marketing strategy forward don’t cost a dime and certainly aren’t available by the dozen. They’re going to cost you. Debt financing can help, and it’s something you should strongly consider for SaaS recruitment. Standing still for too long will only result in competitors passing you up, recruiting the best talent to their SaaS team, and ultimately winning more subscribers to their platform (and perhaps winning over some of your hard-earned subscribers, too).
Scaling SaaS through Marketing
Every SaaS business goes about its marketing differently. Maybe your product is a specific solution in an industry with a minimal need for software, resulting in lower online traffic search and necessitating more outbound efforts. Perhaps your product is one contender in a marketplace rife with competitors, necessitating a more strategic inbound approach. Or maybe the market you’re targeting does most of its business at a trade show — itself a significant line item in the marketing budget.
Each of these requires a different SaaS marketing strategy to navigate to capture leads. When it’s time to focus on SaaS scaling, however, the challenge isn’t the various channels and tactics in which to best reach your audience. By this point, you’ll already be aware of them. The challenge is accelerating your efforts to reach your audience and acquire new subscribers (and of course, conduct SaaS customer retention marketing).
As a growth capital partner, our funding solutions best serve scaling SaaS businesses through efforts that help them leverage the momentum they’ve already spent time building up. Injecting capital into a predefined marketing strategy can help scaling SaaS businesses put that strategy to use faster, more effectively, and with faster results, thereby helping them acquire new subscribers to increase MRR and continue to retain current accounts.
SaaS Scaling through Focus on Growth
Sometimes, SaaS businesses approach venture debt lenders for working capital that will be used for specific, non-growth related goals. Some debt financing examples include companies that are seeking financing for acquisition purposes. Others apply for it to resolve certain financial items on their books. Still, others consider debt financing to maximize potential valuations during future funding rounds.
One thing SaaS companies should consider with this latter approach is that venture debt is not designed to be obtained and then immediately satisfied. Scaling SaaS businesses that want to secure debt financing to improve future funding round results and then pay back the loan right away may have difficulty getting financing in the first place.
In the end, while it’s not uncommon for lenders to provide financing for these goals, a more effective strategy would be using growth capital for exactly that purpose: growth. If you’re a scaling SaaS company, consider utilizing working capital to recruit top talent to lead the charge into your company’s future, accelerate sales and marketing efforts to reach more customers and retain existing customers, and focus on other growth-oriented goals.
If you have a specific need for working capital and would like to discuss your goals with our team, please fill out the form below. We will be in touch with you right away to learn more about you and how we can help you put venture debt to use for your SaaS business.
