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Dec 2016
32m 35s

20VC: Lessons Learnt From Marc Benioff &...

Harry Stebbings
About this episode

Scott Dorsey is the Managing Partner @ High Alpa, the startup studio that both builds and invests in some of the most exciting SaaS companies today. Prior to HighAlpha, Scott was a successful entrepreneur who co-founded ExactTarget and led the company from start-up to global marketing software leader. ExactTarget went public on the New York Stock Exchange in March 2012 and sold to Salesforce.com in July 2013 for $2.7 billion. At Salesforce, Scott worked directly with Marc Benioff to execute the ExactTarget vision within Salesforce.

 

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Scott made his way into the world of venture from founding ExactTarget?

2.) What was it like to work directly for Marc Benioff? What were the biggest learnings and takeaways? What were the biggest challenges?

3.) With a startup studio producing companies and a fund investing in them, how does Scott avoid the negative signalling that is inherent within these 2 structures?

4.) Having seen so many successful SaaS startups, what does product market fit look like to Scott? From the studio, what are the biggest challenges his startups face in hitting product market fit?

5.) What are the fundamentals that all startups should focus on in the quest for product market fit? What are the challenges? How should this be measured?

Items Mentioned In Today’s Show:

Scott’s Fave Blog: SaaStr

Scott’s Fave Book: Good To Great by Jim Collins

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Scott on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

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