Customer discovery
SaaS go-to-market strategy: segments, sales motions and buyer interviews
How to build a B2B SaaS go-to-market strategy: choose a segment, match a sales motion to your price and buyer, and check both with buyer interviews first.
A B2B SaaS go-to-market strategy comes down to two linked choices: which segment of companies you sell to first, and which sales motion you use to reach them. The sales motion is how a sale happens. Buyers either sign up and pay on their own, buy after a short process with a salesperson, or go through a longer process involving several people at their company. The right motion depends on your price and on who has to approve the purchase, and you can learn both from buyer interviews before you hire a salesperson or spend on ads.
The general version of this process, for any product, is in how to build a go-to-market strategy. This page covers what is specific to selling software to businesses.
A worked example: contract review software
Suppose you have built a tool that reads vendor contracts and flags risky clauses. You can see three possible first segments:
- The only lawyer at a company of 100 to 500 people, who reviews every contract alone.
- Legal teams at large companies, with several lawyers and an approved tool list.
- Procurement teams, who handle vendor contracts before legal sees them.
Each segment implies a different buyer, a different approval path and a different motion. This example is hypothetical and used throughout the page.
Segment by who buys, not only by company size
Company size is a starting point. A useful segment definition also says who feels the problem, who controls the budget, and what they use today. Write your current beliefs as a table and treat every cell as a guess until interviews confirm it:
| Segment | Daily user | Who approves | Likely alternative | Likely motion |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Solo in-house lawyer | The lawyer | The lawyer, or the CFO above a limit | Reading every contract, outside counsel | Self-serve or one demo |
| Large legal team | Junior lawyers | General counsel, plus security and procurement review | Existing contract software, outside firms | Enterprise sales |
| Procurement team | Procurement managers | Head of procurement | Checklists, legal review queue | Sales-assisted |
The three common sales motions
| Motion | How a sale happens | Fits when | Watch for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Self-serve | The buyer signs up, tries the product and pays without talking to anyone | One person can decide, the price is within what they can approve alone, and the product shows value quickly without setup | You need a steady flow of sign-ups; security reviews can stall it |
| Sales-assisted | A trial or demo, then a salesperson answers questions and closes | The purchase needs a manager's approval or some setup | Each deal costs sales time, so the price has to cover it |
| Enterprise sales | A longer process with several approvers, often including security, legal and procurement review | The price is high and the product touches sensitive data or many teams | Long sales cycles; buyers usually want references |
These are broad patterns, not fixed thresholds. The price at which a purchase needs someone else's approval differs between companies, which is exactly why you ask.
Start with founder-led sales, whatever motion you expect
Whichever motion you expect to use later, the first sales are usually made by a founder. In Do Things that Don't Scale, Paul Graham writes that founders have to do sales themselves at first and cannot avoid it by hiring someone to do it for them; later they can hire a salesperson to replace them. He also suggests that B2B founders sometimes pick a single user and act as if they were consultants building something just for that user.
Founder-led sales doubles as research. Every demo tells you who else joined the call, which questions came up and where the deal stalled. Keep notes on each deal in the same format so you can compare them.
Check the segment and motion with buyer interviews
Before you commit to a motion, interview five or six people in each candidate segment. Ask about what they have already done, not what they would do:
- "Walk me through the last piece of software your team bought. Who found it, who tried it, who approved it and how long did it take?" This tells you the motion more reliably than any guess.
- "Tell me about the last contract that caused a problem. What happened and what did it cost?" This tells you how often the problem happens and how much it matters.
- "What do you use today for this, and what does it cost in money and time?"
- "Who else would need to sign off on a tool that reads your contracts?" This surfaces security and legal review early.
Then read the answers against the table. If solo lawyers say they buy tools on a company card after a free trial, self-serve may work. If every answer mentions a security questionnaire, plan for a longer sale. For price, rely on what buyers do rather than what they say; how to research willingness to pay explains why.
It also helps to talk to people who sell to the same buyers, such as account executives at other legal software companies. They can describe how deals in the segment usually close. Tell them up front that you do not want confidential information about their employer; what to do when an expert cannot share confidential information covers how to handle those limits.
See how competitors sell
Competitors' websites show their motion. A "start free trial" button with public prices points to self-serve; "contact sales" with no prices usually means a sales-led process. For public companies, the annual report on Form 10-K gives more. Investor.gov's guide to reading a 10-K explains that Item 1 describes the company's products, services and markets and may discuss the competition it faces. Competitor analysis covers the rest.
Write the decision and a test
Write one line: the segment, the motion and the price you will test. Add the signals that would tell you it is wrong. For example: "Solo in-house lawyers at 100- to 500-person companies, self-serve trial, monthly price. Wrong if most trials need a call with the CFO before anyone pays." Review the line after every ten deals or conversations.
Your next step
Pick the two segments you believe in most and book five buyer interviews in each. Ask each person to walk through their last software purchase, and fill in the segment table with what you hear.
If you need people outside your network, Instant Expert can find people who match a description you write, such as "the only in-house lawyer at a software company with 100 to 500 employees." You review who it finds, it sends your invitations, and you pay only for calls that get booked. The directory pages for sales professionals in legal technology and procurement professionals in enterprise SaaS are one place to start.