Sierra Ventures’ Guest Challenge

The Challenge: How to land enterprise customers in a tough economy

Overview: Winning new customers in a recession is a major challenge for any IT company, especially as enterprises cut spending and look to consolidate vendors. Startups, in particular, face an uphill battle landing their first customers, gaining reference customers, and then expanding their customer base enough to reach profitability. 

In this challenge, Mark Fernandes, Managing Partner at Sierra Ventures, will discuss why recessions are a good time to start companies, how startups can use a down market to their advantage, and why startups – if they want enterprises to even glance their way – need to make their product evaluation and sales processes as frictionless as possible.

Winners: Two winners will earn 25 of the 50 points needed to secure a slot in this year’s Big50 Hot Startup Report. Better still, the two winners will also have a unique opportunity to present their product or service to 3 enterprise technology buyers, all of whom are CXOs from Sierra Ventures’ Advisory Board. 

Startups: Take the Sierra Ventures-Startup50 Customer Challenge for a chance to pitch your startup's product or service to large enterprise CXOs. Take the challenge on Startup50. @Sierra_Ventures, @Startup_50, #Startups, #IT, #VC Click To Tweet

Nuts and bolts: This will be a two-part challenge. Any startup that meets the requirements to enter the Big50 is eligible for this challenge.

The first part of the challenge is simply to fill out the short questionnaire below. This questionnaire asks for a few details about your startup, along with a few questions about your customer acquisition strategy.

From these entries, we will choose 20-25 finalists, who will be invited to pitch their way to the CXOs. We’ll have more information about step 2, along with some expert advice on how to craft your pitches, soon.

Resources: To help you get a better sense of what Mark will be looking for as he evaluates entries, check out these articles and posts:

• Jeff interviews Mark for the Network World story “Nimble tech startups find ways to navigate the pandemic”
• Sierra Ventures blog post “CXO Advice for Tech Startups – Q2 2020“
• Sierra Ventures blog post “Starting a Company in a Recession“

Deadline to complete questionnaire: Update: Due to several requests, the deadline has been extended to EOD, Tuesday, August 18, 2020

Next step: What are you waiting for? Take the challenge today! Good luck!

Sierra Ventures’ Guest Challenge

Winning customers in a tough economy

This form is currently closed for submissions.