CRM Software Veteran Joins Our Team

By Clate Mask on May 12, 2011

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Today, I am pleased to welcome a new member to our leadership team, Greg Head. He’s joining Infusionsoft as our Chief Marketing Officer.

I’ve known Greg for a number of years, and have long been impressed with his thoughtful work and years of proven success as a strategic marketer and brand builder in the CRM software industry. I couldn’t be more pleased to make this announcement. We’re thrilled to have him.

Greg has a sharp understanding of the needs of entrepreneurs and small business marketers. He’s been a part of the great successes in the CRM software industry including ACT! and SalesLogix which led to their acquisition by Symantec and Sage.

He’s joining Infusionsoft at a fun and exciting time in our growth trajectory—the ride from here is going to get even more interesting and fun as we continue our dream to revolutionize the way small businesses grow.

I look forward to Greg’s contributions as we further strengthen our position as the leader in marketing automation for small businesses. Under his strategic marketing leadership, we’ll take Infusionsoft to the next level and drive continued adoption of our all-in-one solution within the small business market.

Here’s the full press release with more details on this announcement, as well as a post on Greg’s blog explaining why he’s hanging up his consulting hat and joining Infusionsoft.

Please wish him a congrats for choosing to join a great team – you can follow Greg on Twitter at @GregHeadAZ.

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InfusionCon 2011: The Biggest and Best Ever!

By Clate Mask on April 1, 2011

Last week, we held our 6th annual user conference, a.k.a., InfusionCon.  It was amazing! We had 1,171 people in attendance. We were shooting for 1,000, so we felt great about the turnout.  The event was a huge success all the way around. Here are a few of my takeaways …

  • Our customers are impressive! To hear the growth stories, see the creative ways folks are using the software and interact with customers was simply impressive.  I love getting the chance to interact with so many customers at once.
  • Phoenix, Arizona in the spring is beautiful. 80 degrees every day.  Plus, we always hold InfusionCon at a great resort.  This year was no exception.  The Arizona Biltmore is a Waldorf Astoria resort and it is truly gorgeous.  I’m not sure how we’ll top that location next year.
  • The features in our new release were a huge hit. On the morning of the first day, Richard Tripp, our VP of Product Management, demo’d the new release.  Our new Web Form Builder, Hosted Web Forms, Integrated Spam Scoring and Web Lead Campaign Template drew rave reviews.  And the design specs we showed at the booth left customers breathless.  Easy is the new norm at Infusionsoft.  It was fun for me to see customers begin to get a taste of that.
  • The Perfect Customer Lifecycle and Marketing Automation Plan struck a chord. We introduced our methodology for delivering strategy and service to new customers… and we had tons of long-time customers clamoring for the service.  I heard many times, “I wish you’d had that service available to me when I started with Infusionsoft.”  That was a little painful to hear, but we spent years perfecting this methodology—we’ve implemented marketing automation for more businesses than any other company on the planet.  Literally.  It feels great to be delivering such a valuable service to our customers.
  • Our partner community is really growing. I had lunch with a roomful of partners and had many conversations with partners who are chomping at the bit to promote Infusionsoft and provide complimentary products and services to our customers.  We listened, learned, discussed our plans with them.  We explained we have consolidated all partner programs under our Marketing Department, and we shared some great changes we’re rolling out now.  Our partners were excited and so am I.
  • The developers community around Infusionsoft is on fire. We had a breakout room for developers to work with and learn from the Infusionsoft Development Team.  Every time I walked by the room, it was bursting at the seams.  We will make the developer track a more significant part of InfusionCon next year, no doubt about that.
  • You reap what you sow. This past year, we worked like crazy to deliver a better product and service than we’ve ever delivered before.  Our stats throughout the year improved.  Our bug counts dropped big-time.  And our deliverability and reliability soared.  As a result, the vibe at InfusionCon was great.  Don’t get me wrong; the vibe is always positive at InfusionCon.  But I was blown away this year at how overwhelmingly positive the vibe was.  It was a great reward for a year of intense, hard work to improve our product and service.  We’ll keep up that intense focus and we’ll look forward to an even better InfusionCon next year.

Finally, I was in awe of my team.  Customers kept asking me if I was stressed out or burdened by the enormity of the conference.  I kept telling people how great I felt, that my people were handling everything and that I was able to just show up and enjoy it.  I am totally grateful for that.  InfusionCon was low stress and pure fun for me, which is a testament to my great team.  Kathy Sacks, Nicole Shoots, Joe Manna and the rest of the event support team did an admirable job.  They are rock stars, which enabled me to just show up and hang out with customers.

I can’t wait till next year! Plan now to attend because I promise you that you don’t want to miss it.

–Clate

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InfusionCon 2011 was Amazing

By Clate on March 31, 2011

Watch the video!

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HubSpot, Marketing Automation & Us

By Clate Mask on March 11, 2011

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There’s been speculation on what the funding of HubSpot means for Infusionsoft. This news is a good time to clarify where we sit in the marketing automation category and why we’re so excited to be leading the Small Business segment of the category.

This investment from Google Ventures, Sequoia and Salesforce.com into HubSpot is a fantastic thing for our industry. At Infusionsoft, we’re doing great and we’re happy for their success. But we’re focused on what we do. And that’s enabling small businesses to convert more leads, get repeat sales, save time and money while they grow their businesses. We love what we’re doing and I wouldn’t trade places with another CEO in the country right now.

How Infusionsoft is Different
I like the HubSpot guys a lot. Within the competitive landscape overview chart featured in their funding announcement earlier this week, I find it interesting they omitted Infusionsoft in the marketing automation category. That might be due to the fact their eyes are more on the medium-sized businesses (the “M” in the Small and Mid-sized Business [SMBs]) than on the “S” that we proudly serve at Infusionsoft. There’s some confusion here about “small business” vs. “SMB.” Truth is, there’s a big difference between the two.

At Infusionsoft we often chuckle at the software industry’s bantering of the term SMB because we’ve found that what they mean is “Smaller Medium-sized Businesses” instead of “Small and Mid-sized Businesses.” By that definition of SMB, HubSpot is for SMBs… and Infusionsoft is for Small Businesses. For us, it’s not a point of major concern as HubSpot targets a more medium-sized company and doesn’t offer the marketing automation technologies our small businesses customers are seeking. If they are invading someone’s space in the Marketing Automation category, it’s that of Marketo, Eloqua, Genius, Pardot, etc. Two players in particular, Eloqua and Marketo are proudly waving the Marketing Automation banner at the large business Enterprise level. We appreciate the work they’re doing to educate the market on the benefits of marketing automation. We’re doing the same thing down here at the small business level. Our companies are in for a lot of fun over the next few years. To put a fine point on the key differences:

  • We are definitely not for Mid-sized businesses. Infusionsoft is for small businesses with under 25 employees.
  • It’s interesting that some are casting HubSpot as a direct competitor to us. That’s just not true. We very rarely bump into HubSpot in the sales cycle. And when we do, the customer frequently buys both Infusionsoft and HubSpot. Our solutions are both referred to as “Marketing Automation” but they are actually very different.
  • Further, we’ve never considered HubSpot a Marketing Automation company, largely because, they’ve deliberately positioned themselves as something different and only recently began to offer the basic technologies that we would consider marketing automation.
  • The other point is that HubSpot’s pricing is much higher than ours. They serve a larger business than we serve. For example, at $250/mo. their customer can set up one lead nurture campaign.  One. When the customer pays $1,500/mo., they can set up 100 campaigns. When our customer pays $199/mo., they can set up unlimited campaigns.

Infusionsoft Leads the Small Business Marketing Automation Space
David Raab, the top analyst covering the marketing automation category points to Infusionsoft as the leader in marketing automation for small business. He recently commented on the news, pointing out that the marketing automation leader in customer size is missing. As I noted already here, I agree with this point. It seems odd Infusionsoft wouldn’t be included in a Marketing Automation category overview. Our customer numbers (6,000+ customers and 20,000+ subscribers) and $23 MM revenue run rate, in addition to our feature set and product positioning makes us one of the leaders in the category and the undisputed leader in marketing automation for small businesses. We’ll continue our dogged pursuit of making the incredible time-saving and revenue-enhancing benefits of marketing automation technologies easier to use and more accessible to the hundreds of thousands of small businesses that have stabilized and are eager to grow profitably.

Looking Ahead
I am thrilled with the progress we’ve made over the years and the leadership position we’ve established in Marketing Automation for Small Businesses. As I’ve noted, our customer numbers and revenue run rate make us the undisputed leader for small businesses. Unlike most Marketing Automation vendors, we are cash-flow positive. We have a complete sales and marketing suite that includes CRM, Email Marketing, Lead Nurture and eCommerce, with a smart automation engine at the core of it all.

It’s this complete solution that our customers love because it helps them convert more leads, get repeat business and automate repetitive tasks so they can save time and make more money.  That’s what small businesses want. That’s what we give them. It’s our passion. We love doing it, and we’ll keep on doing it, for years to come.

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Small Businesses Crave Automation

By Clate Mask on February 17, 2011

With yesterday’s news of Constant Contact acquiring contact management software provider Bantam Live, I thought I’d share our take on what this means for small businesses. We appreciate what Constant Contact has done. Their software introduces beginners to basic email marketing. They’ve helped teach thousands of small businesses to use the email channel simply to market their products and services.

What we’ve found is that those email marketers eventually graduate and seek a more powerful and advanced marketing solution: Marketing Automation.

Infusionsoft is the leader in marketing automation software for small businesses. Our 6000 customers appreciate not only our comprehensive suite, but especially the time savings and revenue growth they experience when our intelligent automation engine does their sales and marketing work for them.  We are happy to give these small businesses the complete marketing automation suite they need to grow their businesses more quickly and profitably.

Customer after customer will tell you that Infusionsoft is core to company success—and gives business owners peace of mind that no lead is ever left behind and sales pipelines are full.

We’re passionate about small businesses and the power that marketing and sales software brings to growing organizations that want to advance their marketing through better systems, designed specifically for businesses like theirs. And we’re excited to continue reaching more marketers who seek the benefits that automation brings.

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Small Businesses Crave Marketing Automation

By Clate Mask on February 17, 2011

With yesterday’s news of Constant Contact acquiring contact management software provider Bantam Live, I thought I’d share our take on what this means for small businesses. We appreciate what Constant Contact has done. Their software introduces beginners to basic email marketing. They’ve helped teach thousands of small businesses to use the email channel simply to market their products and services.

What we’ve found is that those email marketers eventually graduate and seek a more powerful and advanced marketing solution: Marketing Automation.

Infusionsoft is the leader in marketing automation software for small businesses. Our 6000 customers appreciate not only our comprehensive suite, but especially the time savings and revenue growth they experience when our intelligent automation engine does their sales and marketing work for them.  We are happy to give these small businesses the complete marketing automation suite they need to grow their businesses more quickly and profitably.

Customer after customer will tell you that Infusionsoft is core to company success—and gives business owners peace of mind that no lead is ever left behind and sales pipelines are full.

We’re passionate about small businesses and the power that marketing and sales software brings to growing organizations that want to advance their marketing through better systems, designed specifically for businesses like theirs. And we’re excited to continue reaching more marketers who seek the benefits that automation brings.

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Why & How We Invest in New Employees

By Clate on January 25, 2011

Video Link

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10 Lessons I Learned in 2010

By Clate on January 13, 2011

As I sit here on New Year’s Day, looking back on the great things we accomplished at Infusionsoft in 2010 and looking forward to a banner year in 2011, it’s a great time to spell out the Top 10 lessons I learned in 2010.  Here goes…

10. Being the CEO is lonely when it comes to layoffs. Early in the year, our shift to a pure subscription model wasn’t going as well as planned and layoffs became necessary in order to strengthen the company.  It was hard to say goodbye to a bunch of friends (and in a couple of cases, family).  There is no loneliness like having to make an unpopular decision that people don’t agree with.

9. The category of Marketing Automation software has emerged. Due to the traction of many players in the industry, as well as financings and acquisitions in the space, the Marketing Automation industry is finally emerging… and Infusionsoft is the leader in marketing automation for small businesses.

8. Personal coaching is a great way to achieve personal growth. I have done group coaching with Strategic Coach for 5 years and it’s great.  But in 2010, I was fortunate enough to begin coaching with Steve Hardison.  We meet each week.  His coaching has helped me to grow in every facet of my life.

7. Usage is King. Customers who don’t use the software eventually cancel.  Every effort must be made to help our customers launch their marketing campaigns and get the full benefits of our software.  When we approach our business with a philosophy of 100% customer success, everyone wins.

6. Most small businesses aren’t ready for full marketing automation. They want the benefits, but many are unwilling to do the strategic thinking, process mapping and campaign writing that are necessary.  This year, we got clear on the fact that we want to focus on the small businesses that are ready.

5. The power of commitment. “An unwillingness to commit is the high cost of low living.”  I observed how true that is in our business, my own life and entrepreneurship in general.  Commitment is at the heart of all achievement.  And failure to truly commit is the cause of most entrepreneurial shortcomings.

4. The market is showing signs of life for small businesses. After a couple of brutal years, small businesses are starting to invest more in their growth.  Let’s hope the credit markets loosen up so that small businesses can invest even more in their growth.

3. When customers view Infusionsoft as “just an email marketing system,” it’s a lose-lose situation. Email Marketing is not Marketing Automation.

2. When the whole company is committed and united, we can achieve amazing goals. We worked all year to get to cash-flow positive by December.  Through a united effort in sales, marketing, customer service, product development and accounting, we were able to achieve our goal.

1. What doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger. In the first half of the year, we experienced a high cancellation rate and sagging morale.  But through hard work from 130 outstanding employees, we turned that situation around, strengthened the business and prepared ourselves for an amazing 2011!

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2010: A Great Year for Infusionsoft

By Clate Mask on January 13, 2011

InfusionsoftThe numbers are in! Our company performed remarkably well during 2010. We’ve experienced strong growth and accomplished many goals throughout 2010 and has positioned us for an even better 2011. I wanted to take a moment and share with you some of the highlights of last year.

  • More than 6,000 businesses use Infusionsoft to manage 97 million contacts and customer relationships
  • Users sent 1.8 billion email messages in 2010, a 91% increase from 2009
  • Processed more than $744 million across all customers, a 64 percent increase from 2009
  • Ended 2010 with 98.49% email deliverability, verified through ReturnPath
  • Attained a 92% customer satisfaction rating in Q4, the highest in company history
  • Former Intuit software leader Richard Tripp joined Infusionsoft as Vice President of Product Management in Q3
  • Named one of America’s fastest-growing private companies for the fourth year in a row by Inc.
  • Infusionsoft social media channels continue to grow with nearly 25,000 small business owners connecting through Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and the Infusionsoft blog
  • Founders Clate Mask and Scott Martineau’s newly-released book Conquer the Chaos: How to Grow a Successful Small Business Without Going Crazy debuted on the New York Times bestseller list
  • Dozens of small businesses confessed their love for what Infusionsoft helps them do in the “Pitch the Switch” YouTube contest
  • Launched a new API Developers Center. Now developers who work with the Infusionsoft API have premier access to an online support community for educational and how-to advice.

All these milestones (and many more accomplishments) reflect all the hard work that our talented team has done to help revolutionize the way small businesses grow. We all should be proud!

I also wrote up a list of ten lessons I learned from 2010. It’s personal – you might appreciate my lessons from last year as you think about your own small business leadership.

Over the past year, the marketing automation category has come into its own, further validated by heated acquisition activity and aggressive fundraising among mid-market and enterprise-focused providers. This bodes well for us as we’re well positioned to capitalize on the growing interest in the benefits of marketing automation and are bringing its power to the small business marketer, a group that until now has not had access to the capabilities that a marketing automation suite provides. Small businesses with big ambitions, limited staff and a hunger for easier, more effective customer acquisition methods are catching on to the benefits of marketing automation, and with Infusionsoft now have access to this kind of power.

With almost a decade under our belt of working with small business marketers, we understand deeply how to boost the effectiveness of marketing and sales activities. We’re 100% committed to helping our customers experience the benefits that our marketing automation suite provides.

Hungry for more details? Read more in this press release: Infusionsoft Sees Strong Growth in 2010

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My Top 3 New Year’s Resolutions

By Clate Mask on December 21, 2010

My Top 3 New Year's Resolutions (Clate Mask)I’m a pretty resolute guy. I’m not one to set New Year’s Resolutions in January and then let them deteriorate into nothingness by February. Actually, I’m bent on self-improvement and personal development, so I love making New Year’s Resolutions. Every year, I have some that are personal, some about family and some related to Infusionsoft.

When I decided to write out my top three resolutions for 2011, my first inclination was to share my resolutions related to Infusionsoft.  But the more I thought about it, the more I felt it would be great to share my top resolution in each area of my life — Personal, Family and Infusionsoft.

So, at the risk of being overly personal, with the hope you will agree with me that our professional accomplishments are only sustainably achieved to the extent our personal lives are in order, I share with you my top three New Year’s resolutions.

#3: More Reflection Time.

In the heat of the 2010 battle, a year in which Infusionsoft went from burning a million dollars in January to becoming cash-flow positive in December, I struggled to find time to catch my breath, let alone find quiet time for reflection. As the year has come to a close, I’ve done a little more reflection and have found it is empowering in all aspects of my life. The small amount of reflection I have done recently has enabled me to be a little more grateful, a little more patient, a little more peaceful and a little less hurried. Resolution #3 is to block out specific chunks of time on my calendar, shove everything aside, take a deep breath and reflect on my experiences, challenges and accomplishments.

#2: Weekly and Monthly One-on-One Time With My Kids.

I have six kids. I am the CEO of a fast-growing, successful software company. My responsibilities frequently collide. Although I’ve figured out a pretty great balance, I haven’t spent as much one-on-one time with my kids as I’d like (we do a lot of group stuff). In 2011, I’m resolved to spend at least 10 minutes weekly in focused, “I’m-all-about-you” one-on-one time with each of my children, as well as at least an hour-long block per month in some sort of fun, one-on-one connection. When I first set this goal, I felt like 10 minutes per week and a one-hour block per month was pretty pathetic. But after talking with my wife and friends, I realized I probably wasn’t too far outside the norm. Whatever the case, this is Resolution #2.

#1: Customers’ Usage of Infusionsoft.

During 2010, I re-learned the painful lesson that in a software company, the overall customer usage rate is the most important driver of the business. We accomplished great things in 2010, working very hard to help our small business customers get the benefits of our marketing automation software. In 2011, we are taking this initiative to a whole new level. I have set one of my operating metrics around our customers’ usage rate and that metric cascades down to the rest of the organization. In the software business, usage is king. My relentless focus on usage is Resolution #1 for me.

Whatever your resolutions are in 2011, I wish you the best of success!

–Clate

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