Value Inspiration

"Ton, this sounds good. I can see you've got some big results, but how do I know this’ll work for me?"

Great question, glad you asked.

Here’s what I’ve done for SaaS CEOs just like you:

COMPANY: Sana Commerce

BEFORE:
- Prospects saw their solution as a “nice to have” rather than must-have.
- Too many deals were getting postponed or canceled.
- They weren't meeting monthly revenue expectations.

AFTER:
- Win rates increased.
- Deal cycles shortened.
- Average order value increased 20% YoY.

COMPANY: Arrow Labs

BEFORE:
- Sales unproductivity due to lots of noise in their pipeline.
- Growing, but nothing really repeatable.
- The forecast was unpredictable.

AFTER:
- Win rates increased from 30% to 60%.
- While shortening their Sales Cycle 3-4x.
- Business became hyper-scalable in LESS than a year.

COMPANY: SwipeGuide

BEFORE:
- Challenges attracting qualified leads.
- Selling felt like fighting a Windforce-9 headwind.
- They lost too many deals they SHOULD HAVE won.

AFTER:
- Demos are booked by their Ideal Buyers.
- They're converting 2x more deals.
- Sales cycles have shortened.

COMPANY: Wolters Kluwer

BEFORE:
- Prospects ghosting them.
- Too many deals required high discounts to win them.
- Losing too many deals to weaker competitors.

AFTER: 
- Doubled their win rate YoY.
- Improved their average deal size by 42%.
- Shortened their Sales Cycle with 30% in the 1st quarter.


And I have dozens of other success stories like those.

If you want to be the next one, here’s how it works.

We start by building your Traction Foundation.

This is a “Pressure-Cooker” style series of Workshops with 1:1 Coaching;

- Week 1, we bring the characteristics of your Ideal Customer alive.
- Week 2, we clarify what makes your SaaS product valuable & desirable.
- Week 3, we crystalize what makes your SaaS DIFFERENT, not just better.
- Week 4, we tune & test everything so it stands out.


Sounds good?

Good.

DM me the word "RESULTS", and I'll get back to you with the next steps.

Founder

Seedstars

Mentoring Sales-led SaaS Scaleup founders and their teams to overcome their growth challenges.

Mentor Seedstars

Techstars

Mentor Techstars

Future of SaaS

Future of SaaS was founded with a vision of providing the most comprehensive resources, content, and learning materials for SaaS leaders at every stage of growth. This is why we cover everything from finance and investment to marketing, strategy, customer success, DEI, and much more!

Member

Palo Alto Strategy Group

Palo Alto Strategy Group is a strategy consulting firm providing specialized investment advice and due diligence services to technology investors.
We are tech experts by trade, and generalists at heart. We leverage our extensive experience with technology and software companies, from both consulting and executive management perspectives, to help investors achieve superior performance.

Executive Strategist

Thinkers360

Thoughtleader

Unit4

I am responsible for promoting the value of Unit4’s vision to customers, partners and influencers, and inspiring them with tangible proof points how this can help them make a big impact in business.

Chief Evangelist

Global Head of Product Marketing

VP Product & Product Marketing

Product Marketing Manager Agresso

Product Marketing Manager Multivers

Dealermanager

Positioning for Sales-Led SaaS companies | My clients win 6+ out of 10 deals, in 3x less time, at 40%+ higher value using my 4-week "Pressure Cooker" program.

Hey there! Mind if I share something over coffee?

I spent two decades in the corporate world, leading Product Marketing & Product Strategy for a global ERP software company. 

But something kept nagging at me.

I discovered that 75% of SaaS companies struggle to scale, even after finding their market fit. 

That didn't sit right with me.

So in 2017, I took a leap. I founded Value Inspiration with one clear mission: help Sales-led SaaS companies become truly remarkable - you know, the kind their customers can't stop talking about.

Here's what fascinates me: When companies get it right, the results are incredible. 

Through The Remarkable Effect - a methodology I've developed and written about - I've seen companies double their growth and increase average deal values by 40+%, even when markets get tough.

What's the secret sauce? 

It's actually quite simple:

First, get brutally honest about where you stand. 
Real connections with customers start when you drop the corporate speak and tell it like it is.

Second, step outside your bubble. 
Sometimes it takes fresh eyes to spot what's been right in front of you all along.

And finally - this is crucial - put purpose before profits. 
When you obsess about making a real difference for your customers, the money follows naturally.

I'm Ton, by the way. 

If you're a SaaS CEO looking to break away from the pack, I'd love to help make your company remarkable. 

What's your story?

Living in beautiful Javea, Spain 🇪🇸 
Author of The Remarkable Effect | Founder of Value Inspiration

"Your market is too small."
That's what your board said when you presented your narrowed focus.

So you expanded. Cast a wider net. Targeted "all accounting firms" instead of just CFO advisory firms helping SaaS companies raise Series A. 
Built features for everyone instead of going deep for someone.

Now you're competing with 47 other vendors who look exactly like you.
Same features. Same pricing. Same "we help companies grow" messaging.

Here's the question nobody asks in your strategy sessions:
What if you niched down to the point where it feels uncomfortable?

Not comfortable-uncomfortable. Actually uncomfortable. Where your TAM looks "too small" on paper. Where investors question the math. Where you have to say no to 80% of inbound leads.

Because here's what happens at that uncomfortable edge:

The 20% who are perfect for you will pay 3x more. 
They'll stay 5x longer. 
They'll refer without being asked.

You can't please everyone.
But everyone isn't trying to please the few you serve perfectly.

That's where premium pricing lives. 
In the discomfort zone.

More on this in the comments.

Ton Dobbe 🔆

Positioning European SaaS scaleups to beat US competitors | Win rates 30%→60% | Author: The Remarkable Effect

"Here's what your CPO won't tell you..."

"We have a brilliant product strategy. The problem is nobody follows it."

That's what three CPOs told me this month. In confidence.

They know exactly what to build to win. 
They have frameworks. Roadmaps. Vision documents.

But every Monday morning, "urgent" customer requests arrive. 
Every sales QBR, there's "just this one feature" to close deals. 
Every board meeting demands "quick wins."

So they've given up fighting. 
They build what's asked for, not what would win.

Here's the uncomfortable truth:

The feature factory is killing pricing power.

200 features shipped last year. Competitors shipped 20 and are stealing customers. Because they built a moat. Not a feature list.

Why do 70% of product strategies fail? It's not the framework.

It's the overrides.

More on this in the comments.

Your competitor just copied your feature.
Same functionality as yours. Same benefits. Same pricing tier.
You spent 6 months building it first. They copied it in 6 weeks.

Now prospects see two identical solutions. Guess who wins?
The one they already know.

Here's the uncomfortable truth:
When you aim to be 10% better, you're just making their decision harder. 
When everything looks the same, prospects choose the safe option. 
And the safe option is never the unknown challenger.

Simple question:

What would you have to do differently that your competitor wouldn't dare copy?

More on this in the comments.

"...the board knows Salesforce. When I present this internally, they're going to ask why we're taking a risk on a company that... well... what's your thing again?"

Your champion just told you why you're going to lose.

Not because your product is worse. 
Because you tried to be everything to everyone. 
While your competitor owns something specific.

Those 100 "qualified" leads that turned into 5 deals? 
That's not a conversion problem. 
That's a positioning problem.

Simple question:

How many deals are you losing to "safer" choices because you refuse to pick a lane?

More on this in the comments.

Here's the question your board will never ask:
"After 15 years in business, why are you still competing in someone else's category?"

Watched a CEO discover their company had been sitting on category-defining capability for a decade.

Not buried in R&D. Not waiting for development.
Already shipping to customers who were using it for something nobody else could do.

The uncomfortable truth?

They'd been so busy fighting for market share in their "established category" that they never noticed customers had already positioned them somewhere else entirely.

In other words....
Your customers aren't confused about what makes you different.
Most of the time, you are.

Here's the math most CEOs avoid:

"How many deals is your team losing by overselling to people who are already sold?"

Your rep had them at slide 6. By slide 19, they're checking email.

The extra features you showed didn't build confidence - they created doubt.

Complexity kills more deals than competition.

"Why do we copy strategies from people who might be even more lost as we are?"

This question transformed how Chad Rubin, CEO of Profasee and serial entrepreneur who sold his previous SaaS company in 2021, approaches strategy. 

Here's how to stop copying and start leading:

1 - Question belief systems: 
Stop accepting industry norms as gospel. Chad discovered Amazon sellers copying pricing from competitors without knowing if those competitors were profitable. Your biggest opportunities hide behind assumptions everyone else treats as facts.

2 - Use your story as leverage: 
Turn your struggles into competitive advantages. Chad's experience as a struggling Amazon seller became his strongest sales tool—prospects relate to his journey, not just his features. Founder stories create memory and trust that product demos never can.

3 - Connect isolated levers: 
Most businesses optimize individual metrics while missing system-wide opportunities. Look for places where changing one variable creates compound effects across multiple areas of your business.

4 - Build toward effectiveness, not efficiency: 
Position your solution to help customers make money, not just save it. When you're tied to revenue growth instead of cost reduction, customers will fight to keep you and pay you more.

5 - Choose your decisioning framework: 
When customers want features, ask: "Will this make me filthy rich?" If it prevents churn AND maximizes MRR, build it. If it only ticks boxes, skip it.

6 - Zoom out to see the whole system: 
Stop managing business functions in silos. Chad realized pricing and ad spend should work together—a principle that applies to any business with interconnected levers most founders manage separately.

7 - Question what everyone else ignores: 
The biggest levers are often hiding in plain sight. Chad asked why nobody changes price dynamically while everyone obsesses over ad optimization. What obvious opportunity is your industry ignoring?

Want to hear the full story? Link in the 1st comment.

And curious: What industry assumption have you questioned that led to your biggest breakthrough?

#SaaS #B2B #EnterpriseSales #Startups #Leadership

Here's what kills SaaS companies slowly:
"When did you last say no to someone trying to give you money?"

Every customer you've never said no to is a strategy you don't have.

Your positioning gets diluted with every edge case you accept.
Your roadmap gets hijacked by whoever writes the biggest check.
Your team gets confused about who you actually serve.

Here's what no advisor tells SaaS CEOs:

"How many of your reps can consistently move prospects from 'show me your features' to 'you're absolutely right' in a single conversation?"

If the answer is less than half, you don't have a sales problem.
You have a positioning problem.

Your reps are presenting when they should be revealing. 
They're explaining features when they should be exposing blind spots.

"These deals are solid. They'll close this quarter."

Your rep said that six weeks ago. 
The deals are still at 80%. 
They'll be at 80% next week too.

Until suddenly they're lost.

Here's the uncomfortable truth: 
You both know these deals are dead. 
You're just pretending they're not.

Simple question: 
What's more expensive - admitting the deal is dead or pretending it's alive?

More on this in the comments.

"Here's the question no board member asks..."
Just watched another SaaS CEO present their Q3 forecast.

Lots of talk about pipeline coverage. 
Impressive CAC payback improvements. 
Even a slide on competitive wins.

But here's what nobody asked:
"What would it take to add 20 percentage points to your current growth rate?"

Not 2%. Not 5%. Twenty.

Because here's what that question reveals: 
Most CEOs have accepted their growth ceiling as reality. 
They've stopped asking what's actually possible and started optimizing within constraints they created themselves.

The uncomfortable truth? 
The difference between 30% and 50% growth isn't in your product roadmap.
It's in the assumptions you've stopped challenging.

More on this in the comments.

"Here's the math most CEOs avoid..."

Reviewing a client's pricing strategy Friday:

"We need to be more aggressive on pricing." 
"Our competitors are 40% cheaper." 
"Market conditions demand flexibility."

Translation: We're about to destroy our unit economics because we're scared.

Here's the question that changes everything:

"If your biggest competitor matched your price tomorrow, would they bleed money while you stay profitable?"

Most CEOs can't answer this. They don't know their true cost to serve. They don't know which customers are actually profitable. They definitely don't know their competitor's burn rate.

So they discount. And discount. And discount.

Until they've trained the market that their product is worth exactly what they feared it was worth: Less.

The math doesn't lie. Your pricing strategy does.

More on this in the comments.

Here's what kills SaaS companies slowly:

Everyone in aviation maintenance told Dinakara Nagalla, CEO of EmpowerMX, the same thing: "Mechanics need better interfaces. Better dashboards. Better mobile apps."

He ignored them all.

Instead, he asked a different question: "Why does a mechanic leave the aircraft 8 times during an 8-hour shift?"

The uncomfortable truth?

Most SaaS companies optimize what shouldn't exist in the first place.

What this brought Dinakara? 
Sales cycles dropped from 18 months to 6 months. 
Customers became his sales force. 
Successful exit to IFS

Here's the uncomfortable truth about differentiation:
"Do you think your 20% win rate is actually pretty good?"

Most SaaS companies do. They benchmark against industry averages. They celebrate beating 15%.

They don't realize they're losing 80% of deals because prospects see no real difference between vendors.

So they pick based on who's cheaper. Who has the nicer demo. Whose salesperson followed up faster.

You didn't lose to better technology. You lost to "they're all the same, so we'll take the cheapest."

"How do bootstrap SaaS founders often build more profitable businesses than VC-backed ones?"

This was one of the key questions I explored with Samy Dindane, CEO of Hypefury who built profitability by refusing to chase growth.

Here are some of the highlights for sales-led SaaS CEOs:

1 - Choose your constraints deliberately: 
Every platform you don't support is time you can spend perfecting what you do. Samy refused LinkedIn and Instagram requests for years to dominate Twitter scheduling.

2 - Make users your product owners: 
Create Telegram groups with 5-10 power users. Give them direct access, implement their features fast, and they'll become your unpaid evangelists.

3 - Price for freedom, not growth: 
Raised prices from $12 to $30 by focusing on power users who see it as cheap, not mass market who see it as expensive.

4 - Talk to users, not advisors: 
"Figure out what people want and build it for them." Skip the strategy consultants. Your users already know what needs building.

5 - Kill features ruthlessly: 
When only 10 people use a feature weekly, delete it. The maintenance cost exceeds the retention value.

6 - Demo everything in early days: 
Samy gave personal demos to every early user, then asked each for one referral. No automation until 100+ users.

7 - Solve problems others ignore: 
Thread scheduling on Twitter was "too niche" for competitors. That niche became the foundation for a sustainable bootstrap business.

Want to hear the full story? Link in the 1st comment.

And curious: What seemingly "too small" problem in your market might actually be worth solving deeply?

People regularly ask me “Ton, what is ‘The Remarkable Effect’?”

Here is my answer:

Many CEOs think this is about ‘marketing.’

Here’s why they’re wrong.

RoomRaccoon: Win rate jumped from 5% to 50%. Same sales team. Same market. Same product.

ArrowLabs: Conversion rates doubled from 30% to 60%. Sales cycles 4x faster.

Sana Commerce: 20% higher order value without changing pricing strategy.

Wolters Kluwer: 30% faster close times. Nearly doubled won deals. 42% bigger deal size.

Timewax: Highest revenue ever, with the leanest RevOps team.

The side effects:

- Smoother implementation cycles
- Customer success more impactful faster
- R&D less distracted - delivering more impactful releases
- Gross margin improvements across the board

What changed?
One clarity shift that multiplied performance across every department - sales, R&D, customer success, finance, services.
Same people. Same resources. Completely different results.

The Remarkable Effect is when one insight creates business-wide leverage without adding headcount.

Your sales team just came back from the holidays.
They're checking if their hot July deals survived the break. 
Good news: 18 of 20 prospects are still "interested."

Here's the uncomfortable truth: 
Being interested doesn't mean they'll buy from you. 
It means they'll buy from someone.

While your team was out of office, competitors kept working. 
Not to steal "interest" - but to become the only logical choice.

Simple question: 
How many deals in your pipeline would survive if you asked: "Why would you pick us over them?"

More on this in the comments.

"Why do some SaaS products become must-haves while others stay stuck as nice-to-haves?"

This was one of the key questions I explored with Davit Baghdasaryan, CEO of Krisp and former head of product security at Twilio who went from personal pain point to powering 80% of human-to-AI voice interactions.

Here are some of the criticaly highlights:

1 - Build from personal pain: 
Stop solving theoretical problems. Davit's breakthrough came from his own frustration taking calls from Armenia with background noise - creating the fastest feedback loop possible.

2 - Transform marketing experiments into products: 
Their desktop app started as a demo to attract enterprise licensing deals. When it became Product of the Year, they pivoted the entire business model.

3 - Understand alternatives to reveal true pain: 
Ask "what's the alternative?" If customers can easily work around your solution, you're solving a nice-to-have problem, not a critical one.

4 - Focus on essence over speed: 
Davit spent 2-3 years building deep technology before generating revenue. Sometimes the hard path creates unbeatable differentiation.

5 - Let context determine value: 
The same noise cancellation technology is "nice-to-have" for office workers but "critical" for call centers. Context transforms products from optional to essential.

6 - Design magical demos: 
Stop explaining features. Davit would clap during Zoom calls and no one would hear it. That immediate "wow" moment drives demand better than any slide deck.

7 - Think in capabilities, not markets: 
Davit built "remove background noise" capability, not "Zoom meeting software." When AI voice interactions exploded, the same capability captured a new category.

Want to hear the full story? Link in the 1st comment.

And curious: What personal frustration in your daily work could become your next breakthrough product?

#SaaS #B2B  #Leadership

🔆 It's Friday again - time to share an inspiring example of what it means to be remarkable in business software.

Nick Himowicz (#1 Business Model Coach for CEOs) shared something fascinating:

A breakdown of how Lovable is transforming software development by rebuilding their entire business model around AI - not just adding it as a feature.

Here's the story.

Lovable, an AI development platform startup, turned a technology shift into a complete business transformation.

While most companies slap "AI" on their product and call it innovation...
Lovable rebuilt everything: how they reach customers, how they make money, and how they deliver value.

The beautiful thing?

- You don't need to wait for perfect conditions. You don't need to copy what 
- worked before AI. You don't need permission to rethink everything.
- You only need the courage to rebuild your business model from scratch with today's possibilities.

This all comes down to the core Traits I've defined in my book The Remarkable Effect:

- Trait #2 - They offer something valuable & desirable: What took weeks now takes an afternoon
- Trait #6 - They create fans, not just customers: Users become unpaid marketers through pride
- Trait #7 - They focus on the essence: Using their own product to build their product

Remarkable companies don't add AI to old models.
They start from the problem, not the precedent.
They aim to be different - not just better.
That's noticed.

Most companies are selling AI features. 
Lovable is selling a new way to exist.

#1 Business Model Coach for CEOs | I help you create a plan for your next phase of growth | Trained by Alex Osterwalder (Inventor of The Business Model Canvas) | Coached 1,000+ Teams

Most companies make the same mistake.
They slap “AI” on their product and call it innovation.
It isn’t.

AI doesn’t just change the product.
It changes the business model:
→ How you reach customers
→ How you make money
→ How you deliver value

That’s why Lovable stands out to me.

They’re one of my favourite examples of what it looks like when you integrate AI in a clever across your whole business model.

But to really see how they pulled it off, I wanted to break it down visually.

So I studied interviews with Anton Osika (CEO) and Elena Verna (growth) by Harry Stebbings, Lenny Rachitsky and Kevin White, then mapped it onto the Business Model Canvas (by Alexander Osterwalder, Strategyzer.)

Here’s what stood out.

1. Customer Segments (Who it’s for)

→ They started with non-technical solo founders
→ Now spreading inside companies (marketing, ops, HR, product)
→ Real workflows being rebuilt by non-technical people

2. Value Proposition (Why choose Lovable)

→ Type an idea. Minutes later it’s live with hosting, login, database
→ What took weeks now takes an afternoon

3. Customer Relationships (How they work with you)

→ Self-serve and automated
→ Free credits to quick “aha” moment when you publish
→ Growth loop is baked into the product.

4. Channels (How they reach you)

→ Users post “look what I built” on X, LinkedIn, Reddit
(That's free marketing)
→ Every project gets a public page
→ Embeds in blogs, Notion
→ Buzz from Product Hunt, Hacker News
→ SEO compounds as apps go live

5. Revenue Streams (How they make money)

→ Per-seat pricing doesn’t work in AI 
(every request costs money)
→ Usage-based model instead
→ Free daily credits
→ Pay as you build more (Freemium)
→ Enterprise compliance packages
→ Future: revenue sharing + marketplace

6. Key Resources (What powers Lovable)

→ Proprietary AI logic (secret sauce)
→ 35-person team shipping faster than big competitors
→ Culture of speed
→ Community that builds, shares, teaches

7. Key Activities (What they do every day)

→ Keep apps stable
→ Get more users to publishing moment
→ Ship weekly features (using Lovable to build Lovable)
→ Enterprise features added only when pulled by customers

8. Key Partners (Who they depend on)

→ AI models: OpenAI, Anthropic, Google
→ Backend: Supabase, GitHub, Cloudflare
→ Growth: agencies + freelancers helping onboard and build apps

9. Cost Structure (Where money goes)

→ Every AI request costs money
→ Hosting, infrastructure
→ Team salaries (lower with small team)
→ Compliance spend rising with enterprise
→ Almost zero marketing

Why it’s different
1. Speed is the moat: they ship faster than rivals with 100x the funding.
2. Usage beats seats: per-use pricing reflects AI’s real costs.
3. Customer pull: solopreneurs pulled them into enterprise workflows.

Lovable is what a business model looks like when AI is the engine from day one.

What would your business look like if you rebuilt it from scratch with AI at the core?

♻️ Share this if you found it useful.

"What would your customers lose that they can't get anywhere else if your company disappeared tomorrow?"

If the answer takes more than 5 seconds, you don't have differentiation - you have feature lists.

Your customers would miss you for a week, then find an alternative.

That's not a moat. That's borrowed time.

Taplio

Ton Dobbe 🔆's Linkedin Analytics

What is Ton talking about?

Who is engaging with Ton

's Best Posts (last 30 days)

Want to drive more opportunities from LinkedIn?