GoDaddy was founded in 1997 (!) and is not only still with us, but is at $4B in ARR still growing 12% YoY
Is it a SaaS company? Maybe. It's largest growth segment is Business Apps. It sells $700m of them.
5 Interesting Learnings: ⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️
#1. >Huge investment in marketing<
GoDaddy is a marketing engine, investing $439,000,000 (!) in marketing/ads in 2020. A bit of a challenge to the notion of the power of brand at scale.
They did acquire 1.4 million new customers for this $439m, or basically what they brought in in new bookings.
They don’t go profitable on new customers until Year 2, spending $1 to acquire $0.85 in annual bookings.
Churn is a bit murky, but obviously is the key lever here.
#2. SaaS is profitable at scale.
GoDaddy generates $1.1B in free-cash flow from its $4B in revenue -- even after paying $440m in marketing costs each year.
Not too shabby!
#3. Once again, you often need more than 1 product to grow past $1B in ARR.
GoDaddy is a bit like Salesforce, where its original and classic product is no longer its largest, and is also its slowest growing (and most mature) segment:
#4. Added 1.4 Million More Customers in 2020.
A vivid reminder (along with Hubspot's blow-out quarter) that SMB growth in Cloud and SaaS is still going strong!
There’s no seeming ceiling to the number of SMBs that can now buy SaaS and Cloud products.
#5. Freemium is back!
GoDaddy added freemium versions of its website and marketing tools and saw “millions of sign-ups with strong conversion rates”.
Like Atlassian and Hubspot, we see that adding freemium later can work. It doesn’t have to be there on Day 1.
Perhaps the #1 mistake I see startups make after $1m ARR is hiring a VP of Sales that is good ...
But not good for >their< startup. A mismatch.
And revenue then goes down, not up.
Here’s a 5 part test to make sure that doesn’t happen: 👇🏼
#1. Your VP of Sales should have lots of experience selling at your average ACV.
A great VP of Sales that has mainly sold $100k deals just isn’t going to make it at a $5k ACV start-up … no matter how strong they otherwise are.
Whatever your target ACV is for next year, that should be the #1 area your VP of Sales hire is good at.
Being good at a certain deal size also means you know how to manage the velocity, the pipeline, the opportunities needs, the hiring needs, etc. for that type of sale.
Okta is one of the more interesting Cloud / SaaS leaders, growing from its early roots as one of several Cloud identity vendors, to break-out leader today
It's now approaching $1B in ARR, growing a stunning 43% (!) ... and even accelerating!
5 Interesting Learnings:
#1. Still growing 43% at Almost $1B in ARR.
This really is a stunning growth rate, even faster than Slack, Zendesk, Hubspot & more at $1B in ARR.
It shows the size and scale of Cloud continues to just shock us.
#2. NRR at 123% -- And Going Up.
Okta's NRR is a solid 123%, and is actually the highest it has been since IPO, and up from 118% a year ago.
So, no, NRR doesn't have to come down as you scale. Not at all.
The #1 hiring mistake founders make after $1M ARR:
A manager instead of a VP of Marketing
A manager instead of a VP of Product
A manager instead of a VP of Customer Success
A player-coach instead of a true VP of Sales
A product manager for now, not a VP of Engineering
First, the junior hire costs >more<
They aren't accretive. They don't pay for themselves. They don't generate more leads. Close more deals. Ship more features.
A true VP is accretive.
Second, you get burned out
A true VP takes 80%-100% of the function off your plate