Growing Beyond $1M ARR: Mistakes to Avoid in the Valley of Death RevOps 10 min If you are a SaaS business that has crossed the $1m ARR mark, congratulations! You belong to a group of <1% of businesses that manage to reach this number. A bigger challenge lies ahead in the form of the valley of death. Only 4% of SaaS companies reach $1 million in revenue, and only 0.4% make it to $10 million. This is the Valley of Death that has eliminated countless businesses. Scaling to $10 million ARR and beyond is where a lot of promising startups dissolve. As revenue numbers increase, that number shrinks even more.  What is the Valley of Death? The valley of death is that period in the life of a start-up where it has begun operations, but hasn’t started generating revenue. From a start-up receiving its initial capital contribution until it finally starts to generate revenue is what this period covers.  The valley of death is a challenging period for start-ups. This period marks a heightened risk of failure. The longer the time spent in the valley of death, the higher the chances of the company fizzling out. Surviving this death valley is considered a significant milestone for a start-up. It signals better chances of the company reaching maturity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPwF4TeXSQ4&t=5s Carving the Journey from $0-$50 Million According to Abhijeet Vijayvergiya, CEO at Nektar.ai, all start-ups go through similar challenges and they have to navigate through them. The challenges a startup will face at $0-$1m journey will be very different from the challenges at $10-$25m, or $25-$50m. Each stage requires a different approach. Let’s deep dive. 1. Getting to $1 million –  Find your Product Market Fit   In the 0-1 journey, focusing on the core mission of why a startup was formulated is key. This is the stage where founders try to validate their product’s value proposition. They answer questions like: Is there a market for my product? Is there a product fit to that market? Focus is key in this stage. Trying to do a bunch of different things and picking up on what works can be a recipe for disaster. $0-1m is more about taking calibrated steps that help a founder validate their value proposition. A lot of startups fail to go beyond this stage is because of a lack of focus. It’s very easy to get distracted. I think a lot of startups die because they lose focus and they get distracted from their core mission. This does not mean that you can’t pivot. You definitely should pivot when you evolve as a company, you achieve product market fit or you see traction. But at the same time, you should not be doing too many things. That’s a very common mistake I have seen that a lot of start-ups make. Figure out what you’re solving for. Every start-up starts with a vision. You have a problem that you feel is unsolved and something that you can uniquely solve in a way nobody is solving it today. And you can do it X times better in case it’s already sold by somebody. Abhijeet Vijayvergiya Trying to force growth is what makes several startups fail to go beyond this stage. Abhijeet says that an initial team member will always see whether there is a product market fit or not. He advises founders to not force the scale of motion till the time they hit that product market fit.  In the 0-1 million journey, it’s important for any startup to stay focused, get to that product market fit, iterate fast, evolve to solve the problem that was intended for, and do all of it in a way that there is a commercial value attached to it. 2. $1m – $10m – Double Down on what Has Worked This is where the valley of death begins. A stage where you are with a million dollars in revenue with a core value proposition that is validated. But you have this looming danger of scaling to $10 million, where a very minuscule number of startups are able to successfully achieve. So how do you do that? According to Abhijeet, if a startup has achieved product market fit, they will be in a great position to start scaling. He warns against startups starting to open new markets, launch new products, or start talking to different sectors of customers, all in a haste to reach 10 million ARR. What’s important is to constantly look at the problem that the company has solved and how they have solved it. Learn from that and templatize all those learnings into a playbook.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSI_OSEpot8 Do more of what has worked for you. Just doing this makes the $1-$10m journey quite easy. In my past experience, we figured out how the founders sold to the first 5, 10, 20 and 50 people. We could really onboard sales teams in a way that they started delivering their first deal within the first 6 months of joining in a new market. Abhijeet Vijayvergiya Abhijeet also emphasizes on the importance of customer retention while talking of his experience at Capillary Technologies. He says, “We did a great job at retaining our customers. We still have the lowest churn rate in the industry. We’ve always focused on delivering that delight to our users and customers so that they become our evangelists.”  Surviving the valley of death requires founders to understand the pain their company is solving for. They need to be really looking at why the company or the product exists in the first place. Founders also need to find a way to covert the tribal knowledge floating in their minds into a working playbook that can be executed. “The first and foremost thing that you should do once you hit a product market fit & you’re looking to scale and ramp up is to articulate that knowledge that is in your head into a playbook and templatize it. That gives you a solid foundation and a scalable model,” advises Abhijeet. 3. The Journey from $10m to

A 30-60-90 Day Guide for First-Time Directors of Revenue Operations RevOps 10 min Starting a new job as a Director of Revenue Operations is an exciting opportunity to make a significant impact on a company’s revenue growth. To ensure success in this role, it’s essential to have a strategic plan that guides your actions during the crucial first three months. Here’s a 30-60-90 day plan that will help you strategically manage revenue operations and drive sustainable growth. We recently spoke to Hassan Irshad, Director of RevOps at FEVTutor. He shared his approach to this powerful framework, demonstrating how each phase (30, 60, and 90 days) builds strategically upon the last to deliver alignment, trust, and sustained improvement. By breaking down complex goals into achievable milestones, the 30-60-90 day approach empowers RevOps leaders to initiate meaningful change without overwhelming teams. For all the RevOps leaders, it’s a way to approach change with purpose, driving measurable impact and laying the groundwork for long-term success.  The 30-60–90 day framework must be an indispensable tool and here is how you can implement progressive, sustainable growth strategies from day one. First 30 days for a Director of Revenue Operations The purpose should be to gather insights and understand the organization, especially the needs and challenges of different teams. 1. Goals for first 30 days:   i. Meet Key Stakeholders Meet with cross departmental teams like Finance, HR, and Sales to understand their goals, challenges, and priorities. ii. Document Everything Create a “lay of the land” document summarizing findings on different team goals, challenges, and processes.   iii. Understand the Product Take product demos, listen to sales calls, and use tools that show how the product is sold. This helps in understanding the customer needs better. iv. Dive into Your CRM Understand your CRM (whether Salesforce or HubSpot) to assess how the data is organized. This is to check whether it’s easy to use, and identify immediate improvements. The CRM should be the central source of truth, with other tools supporting it. The data should be unified with easier adoption for the teams. v. Build Trust Internally Establish trust within your teams by listening carefully, asking questions about how RevOps can help, and addressing quick fixes to show you’re there to help. Having this trust shows them that you’re here to support their success. Quick wins, such as small fixes that make people’s jobs easier, helps in establishing credibility early. 2. Establish Clear KPIs   i. Understanding Team KPIs It is important to ask you stakeholders about the KPIs that matter to understand their goals and what their expectations are. ii. Aligning KPIs Across Teams Different departments oftentimes work in silos. RevOps should strive to align these departments and check if these KPIs match the overall business objectives. Gaps must be closed if their KPIs don’t align. iii. Setting RevOps KPIs As you approach the end of the first 30 days, start establishing RevOps-specific KPIs that match company goals, which may involve metrics like revenue increase, conversion rates, or improvements in overall efficiency. 3. Tech Stack Audit Deep dive into the existing tools that your company is using. Identify all redundancies, and find opportunities to streamline the entire tech stack. i. Map Out Tools Compile a list of all tools used by teams, noting their purpose and how they work with the CRM. ii. Evaluate Use and Cost Determine if tools are actively used or if there are duplicates. Look for cost-saving opportunities by consolidating tools when possible. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVDJ9KI1tGw&t=869s Next 30 days – Alignment and Control The next 30 days marks a shift from discovery to alignment. The goals should be to create cohesion between departments (e.g., Sales, Marketing) and laying down effective controls. The improvements need to be implemented without overwhelming the teams. This phase combines further exploration with actionable improvements with the primary task being bringing the teams into sync.   1. Ways to bring your teams together i. Encouraging cross-team collaboration by addressing silos and ensuring all teams work toward shared quarterly or company-wide goals. ii. By creating alignment, you help teams see RevOps as a support system rather than an enforcer. This keeps communication channels open and creates buy-in. iii. Based on your findings, introduce controls wherever needed to improve workflow. Example: If close dates aren’t being recorded properly, this could skew reports. Meet with sales, identify the root cause (e.g., manual data entry that is taking too much of a reps’ time), and provide solutions or tools to make their tasks easier. Ensure that controls are practical and developed with the trust built in the first 30 days. Foster internal consensus within teams so that these improvements are adopted seamlessly.   2. Navigate Organizational Politics (i) Barrier Removal Larger organizations may have internal politics or ingrained processes that resist change. Find an internal “sponsor” who trusts and supports RevOps initiatives and can authorize actions to navigate any resistance. (ii) Trust and Consistency As you implement changes, make sure your efforts consistently demonstrate how RevOps can make work easier and more efficient for everyone. 3. Evolving the Tech Stack (i) Assessing Tech Needs If tools aren’t fully integrated (e.g., a tool not writing data back to the CRM), identify their gaps and consider evolving the tech stack. (ii) Holistic View Use insights from the discovery and alignment phases to start envisioning necessary tech improvements that align with company goals. Beginning of the 90-Day Phase: Vision and Execution This phase, described as “Vision and Execution,” involves shaping and executing a strategy based on insights gathered from the discovery and alignment phases. a. Roadmap Creation Create a roadmap covering the next two quarters, focusing on long-term, high-impact changes that align with business goals. Use learnings based on stakeholder needs, organizational goals, and the findings from the first 60 days i. Set Priorities Collaborate with end users (Sales, Marketing, Customer Success) to understand their pressing needs and align the roadmap with these needs. ii. Strategic Execution Prioritize initiatives that will have immediate revenue impact