How to scale a marketplace
As a marketplace figures out how to bring buyers and sellers together and builds liquidity, the virtuous cycle starts kicking in. The growth of sellers and buyers quickly accelerates. The ultimate goal is that a successful startup grows into a big company. But as you begin to scale, there are new considerations and strategies to […]
Sales 3.0: evolution of the software sales function
It’s widely accepted that SaaS has permanently changed software sales. Enterprise software sales once meant a large “boots on the ground” field sales team who knew how to wine and dine the right individuals and stakeholders. With the emergence of SaaS, the sales process became more transactional and less about relationships. With software products at […]
Growing a marketplace: how to spark the virtuous cycle
The virtuous cycle is the holy grail for online marketplaces. In this positive feedback loop, a high number of quality suppliers attract more customers; then more customers attract more suppliers to join. This cycle continues as a self-sustaining growth engine until both supply and demand reach critical mass to be “winner takes all.” But how […]
In the on-demand economy, disruption can come from above
Clayton Christensen has written the book on disruption. He’s one of Silicon Valley’s most popular business school professors and we often subscribe to his theory on disruption from below. With his theory “Disruptive Innovation,” Christensen states that “a product or service takes root initially in simple applications at the bottom of a market and then relentlessly […]
How to seed your marketplace
The earliest days in a marketplace are a tricky time. As I’ve discussed before, there’s a chicken and egg problem when it comes to supply and demand: customers need supply, and suppliers need customers. But it’s nearly impossible to ramp up supply and demand in lock step. We’ve found that in most cases it’s best […]