Latest insights from our blog.

You’re a CRO. So of course, when you think about data entry, you think about The Golden Gate Bridge.   Doesn’t everyone?   The majestic Golden Gate Bridge, brave and tall with its international Orange color, is an iconic landmark, famous across the world.   It’s also a tremendous pain in the backside.   The Bridge needs to be protected against the rust that comes from salty air, fog, and rain. That means that every square inch of its 1.7-mile long span must be painted. It’s a job that can’t be neglected.    It’s a Sisyphean feat. A team of painters paints day in and day out.   Paint.   Dry and start again.   Paint.  Dry and start again.  Day in and day out.   Over and over.   Relentless.   With nothing to show for it.    It sounds exactly like manual data entry, right?   If you're a Chief Revenue Officer in the IT Services sector, you’ll know how familiar this story is. You and your team live it.   Just like the bridge painters, your team spends countless hours inputting data, checking it, verifying it, and passing it on. And then you start over again. Every day.   The Impact   The process saps every single person of their time, resources, and a little bit of their soul. And it stops them from doing anything else.   But that’s not all - manual data entry has a ripple effect on your entire department making your life a lot harder:   Mistakes with invoices: Humans are gonna human. We make mistakes no matter how careful we are. Manual data entry will have errors, which can demand credits and refunds to rectify with customers. Financial discrepancies disrupt operations and can hurt your bottom line.  Unhappy clients: Is any customer happy with mistakes? Of course not. In fact, they make your life difficult and will spread the word. This can damage your company's reputation, and that’s the last thing you need in a highly competitive industry where churn and attracting new customers is a problem.   Delays in reports and closing: People can only type so fast – and when the data entry piles up, delays start. And delays mean you can’t produce reports. Speedy closing cycles become a fairy tale no one believes in. Financial planning and decision-making become fairly impossible.   Revenue all over the place: CROs dream of stable revenue. But errors in data entry can create a kind of revenue limbo. You never know whether your numbers are right. It can impact your cash flow. Financial stability is a lot harder to maintain because forecasting is unreliable. How can you do your job of planning for future growth?  No revenue recognition: We all know what a pain revenue recognition can be. It’s hard to keep track of payments across months, especially when these can change at any given moment due to upselling, cross-selling, and scaling down. When revenue recognition is incomplete, you can’t assess your company's financial health with the accuracy you need. Customer onboarding pushed back: Customers (especially the new ones!) want to start using your products and services as soon as possible. But if your team has stacks of numbers and contracts they have to get through, your customers will have to wait to be onboarded. That means lost business opportunities and higher churn.  Where’s the dough? Too much data entry means delayed payments. Your cash flow is disrupted, and your relationships with suppliers and partners can be at risk.  Your team is constantly annoyed: Considering you and your team are chained to desks manually entering all data, and suffering all these consequences, how can you all feel anything except chronic annoyance?   You’re all painting that Bridge. Day in, day out.   The thing is, no one should need to start their work with burning frustration tears or a deep, soul-searching if-I-can-just-get-through-today sigh.   Everyone in your team (and you!) deserve work that is exciting.   Work that puts your company on good footing. Work that uses your talents and vision.   Steps to stop the manual data tears  So how can the manual data entry woes be tackled?   There are actionable steps you can take to make life easier for you and your team:  Adopt guidelines everyone understands: When the processes and rules are clear, people know what they’re doing. What types of operating procedures do you want? What expectations are important to you? Does everyone have detailed instructions? The clearer everything is, the smaller the risk of costly mistakes.   Train everyone involved: A well-trained team will have the necessary skills and knowledge to input data as fast as possible. They’ll better learn to double-check for accuracy, learn shortcuts and hacks, best practices for data entry, and become aware of the most common errors. The more competent your team, the fewer mistakes.  Invest in software: There are many software solutions available today that can automate data entry tasks. These tools use technologies like optical character recognition (OCR) and machine learning to capture, interpret, and input data. It cuts down the risk of human error, but it also speeds up the data entry process. Furthermore, these tools can integrate with other systems, ensuring that data is consistently accurate across your entire organization.  Updates: Nothing in IT Services stays still for long. Tech changes. If your team keeps up-to-date with the best strategies and system upgrades, they’ll have a useful advantage that makes them more efficient.  Audits at regular intervals: Audits give a good idea of how accurate your data is. Routinely check and verify your data to find and rectify mistakes. And importantly, audits will help you catch if there are patterns or common denominators in mistakes that you can solve. This knocks down the disruption.   The Painter   We get that the list is a lot of work- even more time and resources. You might even feel more overwhelmed than before.   But we’ve got good news. First, a question.   Imagine you’re the head of the Golden Gate Bridge painting team. Someone comes to you with a machine – a self-painter - that would take care of all the soul-sapping, costly and boring painting for you forever.   The machine’s proven to work. It runs itself. And it would let you do the things you want to do – making sure the finances are alright, maybe working with marketing and sales to publicize, strategize new revenue streams, and generally keep the stakeholders happy.   You’d take it, right?  That’s what automation can do for your exhausting data entry woes.   Automation gets rid of the tedium of all those repetitive tasks. The potential for mistakes plummets. Time is freed up. No more damage control.   Automation doesn’t just make your operations more efficient. It changes things for you and your team.   It’s empowering, boosting morale and productivity   It enhances customer satisfaction, which brings in both short-term and long-term revenue   It strengthens financial standing with revenue recognition and timely reports   It can all be yours   Yes, manual data entry can be as discouraging as painting the Golden Gate Bridge.   But it doesn’t have to be that way. In fact, it can be for the most part eliminated.   Why not give you and your team the gift of profitability and excitement about your job? Why not allow you and your team to realize your own potential and the potential of your company?  The painter’s waiting.     The average cost of manually processing one invoice is $15.  -Levvel Research Curious to see how your and your team’s morale could improve by 2,945,922,418% (accurate scientific figure)? Schedule a Free Discovery Call today. Step out of the black hole and into clarity.

Knowing what you’ve got, what you’ve had, and what you’ll need has always been important.  Genghis Khan knew this. His empire expanded specifically because he knew about consumption and usage.   And this is something that COOs in IT Services can take some inspiration from. Of course, it might not seem like these two scenarios are remotely from the same planet, let alone similar principles.   But they have striking similarities, so we’ve written this article to give you a little relief and let you know you aren’t alone. Usage and consumption is probably one of your biggest challenges- fortunately it can be overcome.   Ready to find out how?   Genghis Khan: More of a Boss than Springsteen  Genghis had an innate understanding that an army could only be strong if he knew what it needed. Specifically, what was consumed and what would need to be consumed to sustain his conquests.  In the 13th century, information wasn’t exactly in real time. So he needed the next best thing – information on logistics and how much the army would need to consume flowing back as fast and accurately as possible.   By knowing his army’s consumption rates, he could accurately forecast what he would need.   For example, what helped him destroy the Khwarazmian Empire was knowing the usage. Going from what his soldiers used in the past, combined with the challenging terrain they were facing, Khan anticipated they would need additional horses. So he made sure they all had the fresh horses they needed when they needed them.   Your information challenges as an IT Services COO  The grand irony is that 700 years later, you probably haven’t been given the tools you need to know your customers’ consumption rates and how much they might need going forward.   Everything changes so fast in the IT industry (that’s something you have over Genghis!) but information still reigns supreme. Customers have complex needs and demands, which makes it hard if not impossible for you to have any accurate idea of how much they’re consuming at any given time.  Where does this lack of knowledge come from? Here are some of the main causes:  Changing project requirements: The scope of IT projects changes all the time, which means that it’s hard to track resource consumption. As project requirements evolve, you can struggle to best predict and allocate your resources.   Unclear billing guidelines: When there’s no clarity, there’s inconsistency and vagueness. No one knows for sure what can be billed and what can’t, so you’re left unsure how to bill customers with accuracy.   Inadequate time tracking: Traditional time tracking systems can’t generally capture all the billable activities and the correct number of hours allocated and used. That means gaps and mistakes in total hourly consumption data.   Distributed workforce: Teams can be spread across regions, countries, and even time zones. Things get outsourced. The more loose ends there are in the recording and billing process, the more likely things will be missed and mistakes will be made.   No matter what causes you’re faced with, it still leads to the same thing. A nightmare. But if we’re talking specifics, do any of these repercussions for you and your company sound familiar:   Chaotic resource allocation: Resources start to be allocated inefficiently which means delays, cost overruns, underutilization or overutilization of the resources you have left. Project timelines can be pushed back, and profitability pulled down.  Inadequate project strategy and planning: When you don’t have the data, you can’t estimate your project timelines, the resources you need, and any bottlenecks that might come up. Bad planning makes it impossible for you to meet deadlines and deliver projects on time.   Unhappy customers who leave: Both inaccurate bills and delayed service delivery makes customers run for the hills. Why wouldn’t they – your competition offers a much more pleasant experience. They need things brought in fast and on budget and when you don’t deliver, they hurt your reputation too.   Less revenue: The underbilling from inaccurate estimates and errors in consumption recording means you could be haemorrhaging money.    Overworked staff: Teams trying to keep up using legacy systems get exhausted. They make mistakes. They want to leave themselves. None of these outcomes are good.   You crumble: You might be the strongest, toughest person in your organization. But you’re still human, and when you’re forced to act in impossible, unsupported circumstances, it’s going to take a toll whether it’s serious stress, sleepless nights, worry, ulcers, or something else.   Long story short, you shouldn’t have to deal with this problem. Genghis Khan didn’t worry about going to his C-Suite and board having to explain why the army’s lack of that really tasty Mongolian bbq or heavy-duty multi-use weapons cost him a battle. But you do. You have to walk into the boardroom and catch the heat.   Fortunately, there’s a simple solution to it all that clears away both the causes and impacts of not knowing the consumption and billable hours of your customers.   It’s not hiring Genghis Khan, btw. But it does have to do with copying what he did.   The Solution: Automation to the Rescue  When you have a powerful problem, you need a powerful solution.   So why not pull a Genghis and take advantage of the most cutting-edge accurate information systems that are available?   Bringing in an end-to-end solution that handles consumption and billing will make your life so much easier.   Real-time tracking: Hours are captured and recorded, which will automatically log hours and give up up-to-date information on where to put the resources. It cuts down on errors and creates accurate billing.  Task and project monitoring: Individual tasks and projects are tracked, which assigns time entries to deliverables. This means a better breakdown of actual consumed hours.  Working hand-in-hand with CRM: Because automation pulls time tracking and CRM, that means a seamless customer interactions, service requests, etc. You can link customer-specific activities to their consumption hours.  Automated invoicing: This is one of the most popular advantages! Invoices are automatically created applying the right rates. Then they are collected and reconciled without any further action from the revenue team.   Data analytics and reporting: Automation brings the tools that crunch the data and give comprehensive analytics and reporting. The result? Insights into resource utilization trends, specifics about your company and customer reach, and inefficiencies. It also gives you planning and forecasts. This means you can make the best decisions on your pricing and resource allocation so operations are optimized and profits improved.   Real-Time data capture: There’s no point in having data if you can’t access it when you need it. With automation, your systems capture and track resource consumption in real-time and without manual entry errors. You’ll know where you are at any given time.   Resource optimization: Automation keeps track of your resource utilization so you can minimize waste, get excellent visibility into you resource availability and requirements.  Enhanced team efficiency: Automation helps your teams by streamlining workflows, eliminating most of the day-to-day repetitive tasks, cuts administrative burdens, tears down silos between teams, and saves hundreds to thousands of hours a year. They have the time to work on value-adding activities.   Happy customers: Customers won’t have to deal with delays in service thanks to inefficient resource allocation. And they definitely won’t have mistake-ridden invoices. This means they’re far more likely to be happy and stick with your company!   Imagine your operations practically running themselves. Imagine knowing your operations are firing on all cylinders with no additional effort, no sleepless nights, and no endless stress.   Genghis’ Consumption Data Can Be Yours   Genghis Khan's amazing success directly relied on how much he knew about consumed resources, past, present and future.   The grand irony is that hundreds of years later, you as a COO face complexities in legacy systems that make it hard to get the same level of accuracy.  Fortunately automation can change everything for you with the proverbial flick of a switch.   Though you won’t get info on how many horses are needed for battle, you will get all the real-time information that you need for your operations.   By leveraging automation technology at your fingertips, you can bridge the gap between historical excellence and the modern IT demands of the digital age, delivering operational excellence and driving success for you and your company.  86% of consumers will leave a brand they trusted after two bad customer experiences. - Emplifi Bluefort's end-to-end subscription platform simplifies challenges like tracking consumption, ensuring COOs like you can lead with confidence. Ready to transform your business? Schedule a Free Discovery Call today. Step out of the black hole and into clarity.

Alexander the Great wasn’t one of the world’s most successful conquerors by chance.   It wasn’t just luck or audacity either. It was all down to numbers. Numbers that fuelled brilliant strategies.   Alexander relied on the accurate reports of excellent local scouts to consolidate information to outmanoeuvre opponents and power some of the best decisions made in history.   In other words, good data means good decisions.   Even though it’s a new age and arena, it’s the same story for you as a SaaS subscription CFO. You need the right data and accurate reports to make the decisions needed to drive the company forward.   But what happens when the numbers aren’t exactly reliable?  When you’re dealing with bad numbers and unreliable reports, it’s not just a minor inconvenience. It’s something that can have a catastrophic effect on your and your company.   Do any of these problems sound familiar to you?    Lost money: When financial statements and reports are inaccurate, this can lead to regulatory fines. Your investors and customers can run screaming for the hills. And your company might be devalued.   Wasted time: It takes a long time to find the problems, correct them, and reconcile them. Poor quality data can cost an average of $9.7 million a year.   Trust is gone: Once trust is gone, it’s really hard to get it back, especially where money is involved. Inaccurate reports can crush trust with stakeholders like investors, other C-Suite members, and your teams. And morale can plummet as much as revenue.   Resource waste and misallocation: Putting out fires takes up a lot of resources, and there are only so many resources to go around. Making resource decisions while you’re panicked isn’t going to be good for anyone because you’re unable to put enough in areas that drive growth.  Damaged customer relations: Bad numbers can have a knock-on effect of inaccurate billing or reporting that not only causes unreliable reports, but also pushes customers away to a company that will get things right the first time.   Errors in strategy: It’s nearly impossible to form good financial strategy when you’re looking at bad numbers and reports. How would you know what is best to invest in? Or which problems need to be fixed first?   Stress: Losing sleep and dreading going into the boardroom meeting is no way to live. Your role is stressful enough because your decisions are important to the health and future of the company. Things only get worse with incorrect data and reports.   Where do bad numbers and unreliable reports come from?   Inaccurate numbers and unreliable reports don’t just create themselves. They come from these culprits:  Manual processes: It’s no surprise that the more manual data entry that overworked employees have to do, the more chance for errors. Their days are packed with complex calculations, huge volumes of information, and tight deadlines. Without help, it’s a recipe for disaster.   Outdated legacy systems: Though SaaS companies strive for cutting-edge solutions for their customers, they tend to leave themselves behind in the past. The problem is that legacy systems don’t integrate with modern tools. They’re slow and inefficient.   No real-time data: Agility is key in the SaaS landscape. So is compliance. You need to know where your numbers are not only so you can grab opportunities and adjust problems fast, but because audits need to be dealt with asap.   Silos: Silo is the worst 4-letter-word in the business. When information doesn’t flow freely between teams, there’s no way those numbers are going to be accurate.   No matter what the cause of bad numbers and reports, you as the CFO has to walk into that boardroom and hope beyond hope that this time around the report’s right or that you’ll hopefully not get caught before your team can correct the numbers.   That doesn’t sound like a way to live or succeed. You need and deserve the tools that will give you reliable numbers and reports so that you and your teams can keep up with everything and make the decisions that will drive the company to more success.   What’s the solution?   Automation changes everything.   It brings in a level of efficiency and accuracy that you can’t even imagine so that you always have access to the data you need.   Automation makes forecasting and scenario planning possible by using the data you already have to project your needs in light of present and future trends. This means proactive decisions based on predictive insights, rather than simply relying on past performance.   Automation brings you these specific benefits:   Fewer errors: Automated data entry and calculations, means a huge reduction mistakes. Your reports and forecasts are more accurate, which allows you to make confident decisions.  More efficiency: Automation handles the boring repetitive tasks like data entry and reconciliation. According to Accenture, these tasks currently cost your finance team 60-75% of their time!  Real-time data: Automation brings real-time financial data and insights. This enables you as the CFO to make the best decisions where and when they are needed. In the rapidly-changing SaaS market, this is a huge advantage.   No more silos: With automation, information and data flows freely between teams. This means consistency and accuracy. AND, it delivers comprehensive reports so that you always have a complete picture of the company's financial health.  It’s all yours if you want it   Accurate numbers, reports, and forecasts are a must.   Just like accurate data made it possible for Alexander the Great to conquer vast territories in ancient times, you need the best data to guide your company to success.   When you say yes to automation, you cut down on the risks and penalties that outdated manual processes bring. You cut down on mistakes. You cut down on wasted time. And silos and miscommunication. You can finally stop putting out all those fires.   Why not give you and your company the same chance for success that you give your customers?  SaaS discounting lowers customer LTV by 30%. -Paddle Say goodbye to inaccurate forecasts and boost your growth with Bluefort's cutting-edge revenue automation solutions. Learn how our end-to-end system streamlines the revenue process. 

Navigating the world of SaaS FinOps can feel like you're walking a tightrope. While juggling chain saws and bowling balls. Over a tank of starving great white sharks.   What’s ironic is that you are under this pressure during what should be the most exciting time. Your SaaS is growing, scaling, and it might even be nearly time for the next investment round.   It’s only natural to feel apprehension and overwhelm.   And you might have these questions running around in your mind:   How can we switch from loss-making to profitability fast?   How can we stay on top of revenue recognition and forecasting when the SaaS landscape constantly shifts?  Where do I find the time to prepare for financial and regulatory audits and ensure compliance?  What do we do to stop haemorrhaging costs?   How can we align FinOps with the company's big-picture vision?  The FinOps team is expected to course-correct the entire financial model of the SaaS business. It’s like trying to stop and turn around the Titanic with just an ice cream scoop.   We’re a SaaS company that works with SaaS companies. We get that there’s a lot to this. But the more SaaS people know about how to get rid of FinOps headaches, the sooner they can action best practices and make their SaaS company undeniably irresistible to investors.    That’s why we’ve created this comprehensive guide to SaaS FinOps. In it, we’ll chat about the ins and outs of FinOps, the challenges FinOps teams face, the best practices to help turn things around, and the easiest way to get that done.   So, grab a cup of coffee, sit back, and let's dive right in.  SaaS FinOps Responsibilities and Challenges: It's a Wild World Out There  Let’s look a little more in-depth at what’s expected from FinOps and the challenges they must work through while they align the company’s financial situation with the vision for the brand:   Switching from loss to profit-making: SaaS companies start at a loss and continue with loss-making while they’re investing in product development and customer acquisition. But over the last year or two investments have dropped so FinOps are expected to become profitable much faster and earlier.   Indirect responsibility for billing and subscriptions: Though much of the billing and subscription responsibilities are up to RevOps, FinOps has to fold that customer base and low operational costs into a solid bottom line. The problem is that silos can separate the teams so FinOps operates from a lack of knowledge and data.   Nailing revenue recognition, forecasting, and reporting: Recognizing revenue is vexing and without the right tools it’s easy to make mistakes. Despite this, FinOps must match the actual usage of the service while somehow making accurate forecasts and reports to guide decision-making.  Taming the cloud cost beast: When an SaaS scales (especially drastically), cloud costs can go through the roof. That means FinOps MUST keep a real-time eye on cloud usage, find and solve inefficiencies, and optimize costs if they have any hope of bringing in profitability.  Staying compliant with regulations and standards and managing risk: Though risk seeps through the pores of the SaaS industry, FinOps still has to cut it down. Compliance with evolving financial regulations across regions can be a nightmare because it consumes a huge amount of SaaS FinOps time. After all, mistakes are not only costly, but they can be deadly to the brand. Managing cash flow and working capital: Cash is king in the world of SaaS. To survive, FinOps must cut the cash burn rate to the bone, stay liquid, take charge of capital budgeting, negotiate like a kid who has to get ready for bed, and grab every opportunity for growth.  Adapting to rapid changes in the market: FinOps teams must make data-driven decisions to keep up in an evolving market. They need good data and analysis, KPIs, knowledge of customers, trends and forecasts, tech, best practices, and know-how to pivot fast.   How FinOps doesn’t survive on ulcer medication is a mystery greater than the building of the pyramids.   And they have to do all these things with another ultimate goal in mind- they must make the SaaS company an investor magnet throughout the investment cycle.   The Investment Cycle   Seed Round: In the initial seed round, FinOps teams need to present a compelling business plan and demonstrate the market potential of their product or service. They should highlight the company's unique value proposition, target customer segments, and revenue model, as well as provide a roadmap for growth.  Series A: During the Series A round, FinOps teams must present a more detailed financial picture, including historical performance, current financial health, and future projections. They should also provide evidence of traction, such as growing user base, increasing revenues, and strong customer retention rates.  Series B and beyond: As the company progresses through subsequent funding rounds, the FinOps team's role becomes even more critical. They need to showcase continued growth, profitability, and scalability while addressing any potential risks and challenges. This includes providing detailed financial statements, demonstrating cost optimization strategies, and highlighting successful partnerships or acquisitions.  Who Does What - the FinOps team   The best FinOps team are a diverse mix of people with a good range of experience. Though it depends on resources and budgets, these are the roles most often seen:  1) SaaS FinOps Business Manager: They step up to take charge of cloud finance, use and infrastructure, making sure everything runs smoothly and efficiently while keeping costs in check.  2) Project Manager: They keep all the moving parts on track, juggling goals, tasks, and expectations like the boss that they are. They're great at communication and bring everyone together to get the job done.  3) Tech Manager: They’re the wizards behind the curtain, making sure all the tech runs well and supports the company’s objectives.   4) Financial Analyst: The numbers cruncher analyzes financial data, identifies trends, and provides insights to help the company make informed decisions. They create financial models, forecast revenue, and track key performance indicators (KPIs).  5) Compliance and Risk Management Experts: They navigate the complex and constantly-evolving regulatory landscape, find those potential risks, and implement strategies to tackle them.   No matter how great this team is in terms of talent and ability, if they don’t have the right tools, it will be hard for them to do their jobs.   And that can lead to some difficult problems that can really hold them back.   Your SaaS FinOps team might have already experienced some of them.   What happens without the right tools?   There’s no way a FinOps team can manage expectations without help. In this day and age, it just can’t happen.   But what can happen is a lot of fallout.   1) Failing to Align Financial Goals with Business Objectives:  There might be a lack of communication. Or the need to pivot FAST. Or maybe, FinOps has been so busy in damage control mode that it hasn’t been able to think about the future vision.   Whatever the reason, when there’s a misalignment, the financial plans don’t support the big picture. It means misallocating resources, creating inefficiencies, missing opportunities for growth, and financial outlay for a potentially massive course-correction.    2) Unable to Make Data-Driven Decisions:  Everyone knows how valuable data is - especially in SaaS. It lays a great foundation for insights that can power impactful decisions. But if FinOps can’t tap into its power, they’re left with guesswork.   And that means decisions that can actually harm growth and set the company back. Not only could the company become less competitive, but their costs could go through the roof.   3) Inadequate Focus on Cost Optimization:  No one needs the stress of their hard-earned profits eaten up by unnecessary expenses.  FinOps must stay on top of cost optimization, especially cloud infrastructure.   If they can’t, they face bloated expenses, reduced (or no) profitability, and even layoffs to compensate for the financial strain. None of these strengthen confidence in the team.   4) Poor Communication and Collaboration:  Ever felt like you're speaking a different language from your colleagues? That's what happens when there's a lack of communication between FinOps teams and other departments. To avoid misunderstandings and inefficiencies, they need to actively engage with others, share insights, and create a culture of collaboration.   When communication breaks down, it can lead to delays in projects, duplicated efforts, and missed opportunities for innovation. For example, if the development team isn't aware of budget constraints, they might spend time building features that ultimately get cut due to cost concerns.  5) Resistance to Change and Innovation:  In the SaaS race, FinOps teams can't afford to get left behind. If they don't change, try new strategies, or invest in learning, they'll struggle to keep up with the competition and industry advancements.   This resistance leads to stagnation. Pricing models aren’t explored. Emerging trends aren’t leveraged. And then comes the decline in market share. iThe company simply becomes obsolete because customers simply go to a competitor who has got their stuff together.    All this damage and unnecessary stress is exactly why FinOps need to be given the resources that are required to do their jobs.   It’s no exaggeration that when FinOps are under-resourced, it literally can kill the company. Because they become uninvestable.    So what’s the best way to take these potential pitfalls head-on?   How can you as a FinOp team make a significant impact on your company’s organization's success and drive sustainable growth?   There’s one solution that works.  Automation: Your Secret Weapon for SaaS FinOps Success  Automation is the game-changer FinOps teams have been waiting for.   It holds the key to overcoming many of the challenges they face and unlocking growth, profitability, and investibility.   Here are some of the revolutionary changes that automation brings, FAST:  Automating billing, invoicing, and revenue recognition: Automation cuts down on manual errors, saves time, and makes that customers are billed accurately. This reduced churn not only builds the customer base, but helps FinOps with reports and forecasting and frees up cash for FinOps growth initiatives.  Real-time cost tracking and optimization: Automation helps FinOps teams monitor cloud usage and all costs in real-time. Inefficiencies aren’t missed anymore. Cost-saving measures can be implemented more quickly.  Streamlining financial reporting and compliance: Automating accurate financial reporting and compliance tasks saves FinOps teams a lot of time. They avoid the errors that SaaS companies cannot afford in compliance and financial information.  Boosting collaboration and communication: Who is ready to smash silos? Automation streamlines communication and collaboration between FinOps teams and other departments. Boom- more cohesion. Better ideas.  Enhancing customer success and retention: Customer success processes including onboarding, support, and upselling are turned around. Maximized CLV drives revenue growth and frees up resources that can be invested in new customer acquisition.   Automating budgeting and forecasting: Automation allows FinOps to streamline budgeting and forecasting. There’s less manual effort and more accuracy, which means better decision-making and agility.  Improving data analysis and insights: With automation, FinOps teams can collect, analyze, and visualize large volumes of financial data. This gives insights that power strategic decisions and drive growth.  All of these benefits make the company more investible. They also cut down on FinOps’ ulcer medication.   So once the tools are in place and FinOps has the resources and supports that it needs, what the best practices that can put it miles ahead of the competition?   What needs to be done to keep finances smooth and attract investors?   Maximize Your FinOps Operations: Best Practices   Here are some of the most impactful FinOps best practices:  Get your hands on cost management best practices: The latest cost management techniques and tools can give you creative and cutting-edge solutions to problems.   Leverage data-driven insights: Data drives the best decisions. This involves using analytics tools to track KPIs, identify trends, and uncover opportunities for growth.  Streamline financial processes and workflows: There are ways to streamline the processes and workflows, especially the ones that are never-ending time and resource vacuums.   Collaborate effectively with other departments: Other departments like RevOps and DevOps want to collaborate to create unstoppable strategies. The more collaboration, the more other teams help share the burden. They’re there to help you succeed with regular meetings, sharing insights, and fostering a culture of collaboration.  Invest in continuous learning and development: Staying up-to-date with the latest trends, technologies, and best practices will help keep a SaaS competitive in the long-term. The more self-investment, professional development, attending industry events, and participating in relevant online communities and forums, the better the foothold in the SaaS landscape.  Embrace a culture of experimentation and innovation: Trying new approaches, testing different strategies, and learning from successes and failures are necessary to stay ahead. Experimentation leads to the sharpest innovations. Disruption lay at the heart of all of it. Challenge the status quo.   The SaaS landscape is only going to get more crowded and competitive as time goes on.   And until there’s a change in economic volatility and instability, investments are going to be harder to get.   That’s why FinOps deserve all the resources that they need to get things done. They play a pivotal role in driving growth, profitability, and investibility.   By understanding the challenges faced by FinOps teams, embracing best practices, and harnessing the power of automation, SaaS leaders can unlock new avenues for success and secure their place at the forefront of the industry.   Which is exactly where they belong.    SaaS discounting lowers customer LTV by 30%. -Paddle Say goodbye to underperforming revenue and boost your growth with Bluefort's cutting-edge sales automation solutions. Learn how our end-to-end system streamlines pricing models, identifies sales opportunities, breaks down silos, and maximizes customer value.

Being a CEO can be a little…stressful.   We get it. You’re knee-deep in data. Steering your business. Justifying everything to stakeholders. Aiming for profitability and investibility. You’re basically keeping it together in an extremely competitive landscape.   Tough gig.  One of the trickiest things about being a CEO is that everyone looks to you. And that can be a lonely place where you feel like you don’t have a lot of help.   Numbers can drive you crazy. But the wonderful thing is that they can help you put your business firmly on the track to success. You just need to know the right numbers to use.   Enter SaaS metrics.   What are SaaS Metrics?   SaaS metrics are the key performance indicators that show you where your business is in terms of growth, financial performance, customer satisfaction, etc. Each one is like a heart monitor for a different part of your business.   And here’s the great news – every single one of them can help you. Yes, you read that right! Something helping YOU!   Once you pick yourself off the floor from the shock, have a look at what you can gain with SaaS metrics.   How SaaS Metrics are Key to Your CEO Success   Here are how SaaS metrics are the key to your success as a SaaS CEO:  Informed decision making: Metrics give you the foundation you need to make the best decisions. Rock-solid numbers let you know where the business stands on sales strategies, marketing, customer retention, and financial planning. You’ll know what’s working and what isn’t. And that means better decisions.  Forecast the future: You’re in a better position to figure out what your performance will look like because some SaaS metrics give you a real-time snapshot of the trajectory. They help you get proactive and adjust where it’s needed.   Monitor customer engagement: Customer SaaS metrics give you insight into how much customers engage with your products how many customers are leave. This can help you pinpoint causes and strategize to make your customers happier and smash those churn rates.  Maximize revenue: You’ll be able to see what kind of revenue you’re making from customers including your upselling and cross-selling. You’ll find out how much you’re spending to get your customers and how well your business is building revenue from your customer base.   Optimize marketing efforts: You’ll instantly know how well your marketing strategies are working and whether their impact is growing through time. This can help you create goals for high-quality traffic and gaining an advantage of your competition.  Key SaaS Metrics CEOs Should Track  Now you know what SaaS metrics are and how they can benefit you, which metrics should you keep your eye on?   Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR): This metric is the predictable revenue your business expects to get each month. Because recurring revenue can change, it needs to be monitored month-to-month.   It's calculated by adding up the monthly fees from all your customers.  Formula: MRR = Sum of all monthly fees from all customers  Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR): Like the MRR but on an annual scale. It will help you understand your company's growth trajectory. But like the MRR, due to the everchanging nature of recurring revenue, it needs to be checked regularly.  Note that ARR is only for recurring revenue. It should not include one-off or variable fees based on usage.   You calculate ARR by adding up the annualized subscription revenue from all customers. For monthly subscriptions, you would multiply the monthly recurring revenue by 12.  Formula: ARR= MMR x 12   Churn Rate: This SaaS metric is simply the percentage of customers who stop using your product over a given period. It impacts your revenue and lets you know about how happy your base is with your products and service.   Churn is calculated by subtracting the number of customers at the end of a period from the number of customers at the start of that period, dividing by the number of customers at the start of the period, and multiplying by 100 to get a percentage.  Formula: Churn Rate = (Customers at Start of Period - Customers at End of Period) / Customers at Start of Period * 100%  Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC): How much do you spend to get each new customer? Once you know this, you’ll get a better understanding of if your marketing team could be performing better.  You can calculate CAC by dividing the total cost of sales and marketing over a given period by the number of new customers acquired over the same period.  Formula: CAC = Total Cost of Sales and Marketing / Number of New Customers Acquired  Customer Lifetime Value (CLTV): This is a big one for SaaS subscription businesses! This SaaS metric lets you know the total amount of revenue you are likely to get from a customer over a lifetime. It’s a current snapshot of your customer loyalty and profitability.  It's calculated by multiplying the average purchase value by the average purchase frequency and then by the average customer lifespan. This helps you understand the value of your customers over the long term.  Formula: LTV = Average Purchase Value x Average Purchase Frequency x Average Customer Lifespan Qualified Marketing Traffic (QMT): People who have checked out your website or other content and shown some interest in your brand who meet certain criteria that make them potential customers. Knowing this SaaS metric will help you see if marketing is attracting the right people.   This is a tricky one to calculate with a formula because your idea of a quality lead can vary. So you just identify how many visitors meet your demographic and customer behaviour criteria.   Customer Engagement Score (CES): How much is a specific customer using your product? It’s good to know because if they aren’t using it very much, they might bounce.   This SaaS metric score is another one that depends on your specific business and what actions you value. But most typically, you’ll assign points to actions like how many times they log in, how long they use your product for, whether they complete tasks, etc. Then you add up the points over a given time period.   Formula: CES = Sum of (User Action Points x Number of Times Action Performed)  Net Revenue Return (NRR): This SaaS metric measures how much you’re getting from existing customers (upsells, cross-sells, downgrades, and churn). The percentage accounts for losses and gains, so it shows you how healthy your SaaS business is.   To calculate it, start with the revenue you had at the beginning of a period, add any upsell or cross-sell revenue, subtract any downgrades or churn, and then divide by the revenue at the beginning of the period. Multiply by 100% to get the final percentage.   Formula: NRR = ((Starting MRR + Expansion - Downgrades - Churn) / Starting MRR) * 100%  Lead Velocity Rate (LVR): Want insight into how fast your base of customers is growing? This is the SaaS metric for you. It’s very helpful in predicting future sales and revenue growth.  To calculate LVR, subtract qualified leads last month from qualified leads this month. Then divide by qualified leads from last month. Then multiple by 100% to get the percentage.   Formula: LVR = ((Qualified Leads This Month - Qualified Leads Last Month) / Qualified Leads Last Month) * 100%  Conclusion  Each of this SaaS metrics individually will give you useful insight. But if you use all of them, you’ll get a well-rounded idea of how your company is performing, and which areas need more focus and better strategies.   SaaS metrics might just be numbers, but they’re also hack you need to figure out what to change so that you can boost your chances of success.   If you’d like a chat about how we can help you boost your numbers with ease and automation, we’re here to listen to your situation and goals.   And if you've got some insights or experiences of your own to share, we'd love to hear about them. After all, we're a SaaS company too, on this journey with you.   SaaS discounting lowers customer LTV by 30%. -Paddle Say goodbye to underperforming revenue and boost your growth with Bluefort's cutting-edge sales automation solutions. Learn how our end-to-end system streamlines pricing models, identifies sales opportunities, breaks down silos, and maximizes customer value.

Customers.   Who needs them?  They’re a pain. They drain our resources. We spend all our time making them happy. And we build SaaS businesses to solve their problems.   We say – enough is enough!!! It’s time to get rid of them using one of the quickest ways possible – your product offerings.   That’s why we’ve put together the ultimate guide on how to transform customers into little Usain Bolts. We're talking PEOPLE STAMPEDE. So grab a beverage, sit back and check out 7 ways you can finally be legends of churn and be free of customers forever.   Strategies to cut customer retention with your offerings    If you’re the kind of COO who wants to keep your teams busy with damage control, more work, and more effort, churn is the way to go.    That goes double if you like haemorrhaging money.  You don’t have to take a lot of time figuring out what to do. You can focus on your offerings – they’re key to your customer relations. Mess up the offerings and customer retention’s done for.   So what are the most effective strategies to create offerings that get those customers out of your life for good?   Don't Bother Learning About Your Customers: Who needs to understand their customers anyway? There’s no point in trying to use the data you’ve got on customer behaviour. You don’t need to keep track of what they like if they’re going to leave! Ignorance is bliss! Ignoring customer preferences is the quickest way to an empty customer database.  Don't Segment Your Customers: There’s no point in segmenting your customers into categories based on age, location, job, budget, needs, or anything else. Keep them a big indistinguishable mass, like a swamp blob. When you’re free from segmentation, you’re free from tailoring your marketing and sales approach to each customer. Who needs to feel valued and understood?  Choose a Rigid, One-Size-Fits-All Pricing Strategy: Flexibility is for gymnasts, not customers. If you keep the pricing for your product offering super rigid you’ll broadcast "we don't care about your specific needs" much more efficiently.     Make pricing super complex and annoying: On the other hand, you could pick 2,489,881 different pricing models that make no sense and throw them at the customers. Let them sort it all out or find a competitor who keeps things simple and offers them what they need, when they need it. No one needs that kind of troubled life.    Keep your products a secret and don’t show off their value: It’s okay to keep quiet about your  products, their functions and their benefits (especially the new ones). No one should have the burden of growth – it takes way too much time to count all that money. Give us stagnation and missed opportunities galore!  When someone mentions usage data, close your eyes, cover your ears and shout LALALALALA: No one cares about how much your customers use except your customers. If they want to know about contracts, it’s a free country! If you let them pay for things they don't need and offer them add-ons that don’t take their needs into account, it will leave a sour taste in their mouth and cut your customer retention to the bone. They might even tell their friends and colleagues about it.   Let your sales team wing it: Sales teams are at their best when they guess. No one needs preparation and customer insight to guide offerings. Let them act like life is a game show and randomly pick whatever– with higher stakes and no prizes.  Contact customers at random times: Life is best without stress, so contact your customers whenever you can get around to it. Don’t worry about keeping track of when it’s time for a cross-sell or an upsell. For extra points, wait a few weeks have sales call them again, and offer them something that’s even worse.   And whatever you do, avoid automation AT ALL COSTS: The problem with automation of your product and pricing processes is that it makes dropping the ball impossible. Who needs any of these:   Personalization: Automation teaches you about your customers by crunching the data from their preferences and buying behavior, which means they get pricing and offering that keeps them happy and coming back for more.   Segmentation: You’ll segment your customers so that both your message and your offerings are as specific to their circumstances as possible.   Flexible Pricing: Automated pricing strategies will stay clear, logical, and show off the value of your products. They will also take into consideration usage so that the customer saves as much as possible and you know which products and services they need.   Product Updates: Automation will let your customers stay on top of your new products, what they do, and how they can benefit from them. That boosts the chances of upselling and cross-selling.   Sales Intelligence: With automation, your sales team will always know what to offer each customer, eliminating the guesswork and improving conversion rates.  Offerings at the right time: Automation not only decides what offerings and prices to send, but channels this info to the right salesperson when the customer needs it. No more missed opportunities.   Automation sounds like a nightmare. So steer well clear of that!    And that’s the list!   If you've followed all these steps, congratulations! You're on the fast track to an empty customer database.   Now, there are some people who are reading this article, thinking “But I want to keep my customers. I need tips to better customer retention through offerings.”   We’re not trying to judge. We’ve all got our own path to follow. Just do the opposite.   86% of consumers will leave a brand they trusted after two bad customer experiences. - Emplifi Get the perfect offerings for the perfect customers at the perfect time. Say goodbye to missed opportunities and boost your growth with Bluefort's cutting-edge automation solutions. Learn how our end-to-end system streamlines product offerings and maximizes long-term customer value.

You’re a SaaS CEO plagued by underperforming sales revenue. You might even have to deal with loss-making deals. So our first question is this -   How long has it been since you’ve had a good night’s sleep?   You know it all too well- it doesn’t matter what the cause of your sales problems because it’s you at the end of the day, in the boardroom, taking the rap for why things are wrong.  We’ve worked with a lot of SaaS CEOs and we’ve heard their challenges. That's why we wrote this article on strategies for boosting underperforming sales, sharing the insights we’ve gained along the way.   The Silent Destroyers: Underperformance and Loss-Making Orders  Both are red flags on your financial dashboard. And they undermine your business and the well-being of you and your team.  And it’s not just a revenue problem that manifests in staff layoffs and budget cuts. These challenges can put a ton of stress on you and your teams which means longer hours. Tougher expectations.   That’s when the sleepless nights kick in. And possibility anxiety. All stuff that you don’t need.   What Causes Sales Underperformance and Loss-Making Deals?  It’s only from understanding the causes of sales underperformance and loss-making deals that anything can be done about it.   Here’s what we hear CEOs talk about the most. Do any of these sound familiar?    Poor market research: Skimping on market research never works out well - it just means you waste time and money offering a product that doesn't resonate using marketing messages customers don’t care about.   Many companies overlook research (ideally segmented research with personas) will give ideal customers' needs or preferences. B2B buyers are researching SaaS companies before they get in touch for solutions, so when SaaS companies don’t do the same, they put themselves at a huge disadvantage.   Bad pricing: Pricing can be a nightmare in the SaaS industry because of all the factors involved. There’s a lot of complexity that can turn keeping up with customer demand and the ever-changing landscape of competitors’ pricing into an impossible ask. And we haven’t even gotten to the differences in pricing between individual customers!   Discounts and promotions can be a total killer. When pricing doesn’t reflect the value your products and services give, you’re stuck with either loss-making deals or deals that have customers jumping ship the millisecond a competitor offers something better.   High Customer Acquisition Costs: This can be down to sales salaries being too high compared to the 4-5x of revenue they’re supposed to bring in. It can be down to a bad website that causes people to bounce within seconds. And it can be down to marketing.  Often it’s all three. No matter what it is, it’s a costly disaster.   Subpar CX: There’s no denying that customer experience is one of the most important factors in sales (and customer retention!). SaaS businesses ignore this at their peril, even if they’ve got an exclusive or genius product.  Why? There’s simply too much competition out there who will swoop in, and give customers the well-designed user interface, simple navigation, targeted offering and messaging, and knowledgeable and organized sales and service that get them to say yes.    Admin: Soul-sapping, repetitive tasks are everyone’s natural enemy, but this is particularly true with sales teams. According to McKinsey, only 39% of a sales rep’s time is spent selling or interacting with prospects and customers. The rest is admin. If they don’t have tools that sort admin, revenue will never be what it could be.   It can all be a mess that you constantly mop up. Fortunately, there are ways of turning it around.   Strategies for Boosting Sales and Preventing Loss-Making Deals  When you’re ready to boost your underperforming sales and bring in more of that sweet, sweet cash, there are strategies you can use. Here are some of the most effective:   Get to know who your customers are: Research your ideal segments to shape your products, services, pricing, and how to best reach them.   Optimize that pricing: The best pricing strategies are flexible and tailored. They’re easy to keep track of no matter how complex. And they reflect the true value of your products and services.   Cut down on customer acquisition cost: Boost the relationship between sales team salaries and incoming revenue by giving them the support they need to sell as much as possible. Ensure your website performance is excellent. And invest in marketing that uses SEO, social media marketing, content marketing, and influencer marketing to boost your reach and credibility.  Enhance customer experience: Give your existing and your potential customers the best experience possible. Make it easy for them to learn what you’re all about. Communicate with them on their terms. Give your sales and customer relations people the time they need to grow those relationships. Train your sales team: Your sales team should have a solid foundation in your product and service offering and how to know what to pitch to potential customers. They should also be trained in building long-term relationships with customers. And they should know how to work with your revenue and customer service teams to keep information accurate and streamlined.   Monitor your competitors: It’s absolutely vital to keep an eye on what your competitors are doing all the time. It’s a big ask, but how else will you know what’s out there attracting your potential customers? The great thing is that you can keep an eye on their failures just as much as their successes. You’ll learn from both.  All these strategies do take a lot of time and resources, but if you need to boost these sales, they’ll have to be done.   If it feels like too much of a drain on your time and resources, there is one option you can do that takes care of almost everything in one fell swoop.   The Game Changer: Automation  Automation is a powerful tool that can completely change how you and your people do sales. It can also revolutionise your results. High-performing companies are 2x as likely to have automated sales processes (Velocify).    Here’s how it can make underperforming sales a thing of the past:   Operations are streamlined: Repetitive tasks that sales, revenue, and customer service teams have to do are eliminated, freeing teams to focus on strategic tasks that drive sales. Automation can cut those business costs by 60-70% and transaction times by up to 80% (Forrester).  Customer experience is improved: Automation keeps you in touch with your customers. They get instant responses and offerings specifically tailored to them when they need it.    Your data is enhanced: AI-driven automation collects, manages, and analyzes data much more effectively. You’ll know your customer better. And insights are available 24-7 to whoever needs them.  No more lost sales opportunities: Automation creates new sales opportunities and spots upselling and cross-selling opportunities. It also identifies the best time for the sale and feeds them directly to the right salesperson.    The best pricing: Automation constantly monitors the landscape and creates and keeps track of the best pricing possible.   Reduced Errors: Automation cuts down costly errors in sales and billing because it eliminates silos between the revenue, sales, and billings teams.   Your numbers are reliable: Because everything is streamlined, customers are kept track of between departments, and errors cut down, you can rest assured knowing your revenue numbers are reliable and will adjust when things change.   All this means you and your teams are less stressed, happier, and more productive.   And you’re finally sleeping at night.   Conclusion  It can be overwhelming to have to tackle underperforming sales.   But knowing the root causes and most effective strategies certainly makes things easier for you to turn things around. And the best news of all is that you can let automation take care of all the problems so that you can reap the rewards of boosted sales performance.   You’re a SaaS business. You exist because you give your customers cutting-edge solutions to your problems.   So why not do the same for you and your teams?  SaaS discounting lowers customer LTV by 30%. -Paddle Say goodbye to underperforming revenue and boost your growth with Bluefort's cutting-edge sales automation solutions. Learn how our end-to-end system streamlines pricing models, identifies sales opportunities, breaks down silos, and maximizes customer value.