In the latest episode of B2B Outbound, Chris sat down with two incredible guests: our very own Kenny Anderson, Chief Commercial Officer at Punch!, and the legendary Sangram Vajre, Co-founder and CEO at GTM Partners – or as many know him, the “godfather of ABM.”
Spoiler alert: The SaaS business model you’ve been building your strategy around? It might be on its deathbed.
Meet the Man, the Myth, the Legend
If you’ve been in B2B marketing for more than five minutes, you’ve probably heard of Sangram Vajre. His journey can be summed up in three powerful acronyms:
“MA for marketing automation. That’s where I ran marketing at Pardot, and got acquired by ExactTarget and Salesforce… ABM [at Terminus]… and now in 2020, late 2020, 21… I felt like there’s a layer above all of this, which is go to market.”
From growing Pardot from $10M to being acquired by Salesforce for $2.7B, to founding Terminus and pioneering the Account-Based Marketing (ABM) movement, to now leading GTM Partners – Sangram has had “front row seats to some incredibly big, almost life-changing categories getting built.”
Why a Services Company After SaaS Success?
When asked about his shift from building SaaS companies to running an advisory firm, Sangram didn’t mince words:
“Some say I might need some therapy going from a SaaS business having multiples to building a services advisory business… but I feel like for the next decade of my life, I want to build new frameworks. I want to build new ways companies can more efficiently go to market.”
The timing couldn’t be better. As Sangram points out:
“I’m glad I’m not building a SaaS company, because right now we can sell 10,000 a month, 50,000, $100,000 advisory award. And I have CEO, founder friends of mine who are trying to sell 1000 bucks a month software, and nobody’s buying.”
The Rise of “Service as a Software”
Here’s where things get seriously disruptive. Sangram predicts we’re about to witness a major shift in how companies buy technology:
“We predict that in the next six to 12 months, all these big SaaS companies that have $100,000+ deals, they are going to have a hard time selling.”
Why? Because the ROI expectations have shrunk from six months to just three, and buyers are increasingly frustrated with the traditional SaaS model:
- Buy a $100,000 platform
- Spend another $500,000 training people to use it
- Hire a services company to support implementation
- Hope to see ROI in a year
- Repeat with multiple tools
Instead, Sangram believes companies will start saying:
“I need a service that actually delivers on these target ICPs, that provides intentional outcome… I would rather pay you $10,000 a month or $20,000 a month to know that it’s going to be performed by experts who are going to constantly be looking at tools that work and discard the tools that don’t work.”
This isn’t just theory – it’s already happening. Just look at Terminus, which was acquired by demand science, an agency. As Sangram notes: “I never, ever thought that I’m building a software company to be acquired by an agency… but that’s what happened.”
The Go-to-Market Operating System
So what’s the alternative to traditional marketing and sales approaches? Sangram and his team have developed the “Go-to-Market Operating System” – a framework built around asking the right questions:
“For the longest time, we were actually asking the wrong questions. I personally was asking a really horrible question, which is like, ‘Where can you grow?’ On the surface that sounds like a smart and good question, but the reality is that… I can grow in many different areas.”
The better questions? “Where can you grow the most that had the highest profit margin and that can actually serve your customers?”
Or instead of asking “What’s your point of view?” ask “What is your differentiated point of view that makes your business tick and your customers want to do more business with you?”
Who Owns Go-to-Market?
One of the most fundamental shifts Sangram advocates for is having the CEO own go-to-market strategy:
“The CEO has to be in the room and has to own go to market. Because if marketing could make that decision, they would have made that and said, ‘Well, all leads should you know, or whatever leads we give, are the most important leads.'”
This insight came from a conversation with Brian Halligan, former CEO of HubSpot:
“Should you launch a product, or should you buy a company? It’s a go-to-market decision. Should you invest in marketing or sales? It’s a go-to-market decision. Should you open an office in EMEA or stay in North America? That’s a go-to-market decision.”
Systems Over Goals
If there’s one thread that runs through all of Sangram’s success, it’s his focus on building systems rather than just setting goals:
“People don’t rise to the level of their goals. They fall to the level of their systems.”
This insight from James Clear’s “Atomic Habits” has shaped Sangram’s approach:
“We all have the same goals… only a few are able to do it. And the difference really is that it’s not a goal that’s different… it’s the system like, what system are you implementing to be accountable to that?”
What’s Next for GTM Partners?
With 70,000 people already taking their courses and 175,000 reading their “GTM Monday” newsletter, Sangram has his sights set on ambitious growth:
“For 2025, our goal is to get 100,000 companies certified on go-to-market operating system… We want better companies to run on go-to-market OS.”
As Sangram puts it: “EOS is really about the why and the what you want to do, and GTMOS is about the how and the when.”
The Bottom Line
If you’re still focused solely on MQLs and traditional SaaS sales tactics, you might be fighting yesterday’s battle. The future belongs to those who can think in decades, build effective systems, and deliver actual outcomes – not just software.
As Sangram wisely advises: “Put your head down, stick to the system. Put in a decade, and you’ll be further along than most people that you can ever, ever see around you.”
What’s your take on the shift from SaaS to service? Are you seeing these changes in your own business? Let us know in the comments!
P.S. If you want to chat more about go-to-market strategy, hit up Sangram on LinkedIn. With 175,000 readers of his GTM Monday newsletter, he clearly knows a thing or two about building movements.