Topline

Sam Slevin, Global SVP of Customer Success at AlphaSense, joins Sam Jacobs, AJ Bruno, and Asad Zaman on the AI-era customer success playbook. Topics include why service is the differentiator over the next 2 to 3 years, the case for customer success owning a revenue number from day one, the gap between finance's productivity targets and real-life capacity. Plus, the origins of customer success, why consumption-based pricing can quickly become a trap, and a bull-versus-bear debate on whether HubSpot can get back to a $20 billion market cap. In short... big episode!

Key Takeaways:

- After 17 years building customer success teams, Sam Slevin doesn't entertain the "should CS own a number" debate. As Sam Slevin, Global SVP of Customer Success at AlphaSense, put it: "in my 17 years of, of customer success and leadership within customer success, that has never actually been a debate for, for me. I, I would never take a role that doesn't have revenue focused and like impact owning a number, calling your forecast from day one." His standing practice when he joins a new company: build a top-down and bottoms-up forecast on day one and validate it the same way sales does.

- Slevin's central thesis is that AI raises the floor on automation while service becomes the upside lever for the next 2 to 3 years. As Slevin put it: "I don't think there could be a more exciting time to be in customer success where service feels like it could be the major differentiator over the next 2 to 3 years." The CS team that listens carefully, builds deep relationships, and meets customers where they are wins the renewal and the expansion.

- The hardest tension in CS productivity is the gap between what finance models demand and what individual accounts actually support. As Slevin put it on his approach: "I definitely want to increase productivity in ARR per AM. What's interesting is I feel like there's a finance model and then there's a real life model… finance will say we need $15 million per AM." The leader's job, Slevin argues, is to find the 10% operational drag (AM-to-AE handoffs, billing friction, segmentation gaps) and remove it to close the gap.

- On HubSpot's path back to $20 billion, AJ Bruno takes the bullish side based on customer behavior signals. As AJ Bruno, CEO at QuotaPath, put it: "And the fact that they've gone horizontal, um, now I know that there are like 70% of their customers are still looking for answers for HubSpot of what AI needs to look like, and they haven't let the opportunity yet pass them by, but it's getting shaky right now." Sam Jacobs took the bearish side, citing structural challenges and faster-moving AI-first competitors.

Connect with the Hosts & Guests:

Host: Sam Jacobs, CEO at Pavilion - https://www.linkedin.com/in/samfjacobs/

Host: AJ Bruno, CEO at QuotaPath - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajbruno3/

Host: Asad Zaman, CEO at Sales Talent Agency - https://www.linkedin.com/in/azaman1/

Guest: Sam Slevin, Global SVP Customer Success at AlphaSense - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sam-slevin-9b2ba21b/

Topline is more than a YouTube Channel:

Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://toplinemedia.substack.com/

Tune into Topline Podcast, the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-podcast

Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Chapters:

00:00 Introducing Sam Slevin

03:13 Customer Success in the AI Era

04:28 Should CS Own a Number?

07:43 Gross Retention vs. Growth

11:02 The Number-Owner Premium

14:37 Service as the AI-Era Moat

22:19 Productivity Per Person

26:34 Vendor Spend and AI Voice Modes

35:12 Reimagining GTM Roles

38:51 Quiz Pro Quo

45:38 Seat to Usage-Based Pricing

50:12 Pricing AI Like a Meter

55:43 CSM vs Salesperson Comp Gap

58:43 Bulls and Bears

Ryan Burke, VP of Worldwide Sales at Crogl, joins Sam Jacobs, AJ Bruno, and Asad Zaman on the new economics of enterprise cyber risk. Topics include Anthropic's Mythos model, AI for the security operations center, why vibe-coded apps are far more likely to have security issues, why Claude Design tanked Figma's stock, and what the Elon Musk versus OpenAI lawsuit signals for AI governance.

Key takeaways: AI has crashed the cost of running sophisticated attacks, putting nation-state-grade tooling in the hands of low-skill operators. As Ryan Burke, VP of Worldwide Sales at Crogl, put it on Anthropic's Mythos model: "Mythos has lowered the cost to like the dollar menu equivalent of...running an attack...so more people can do it." Enterprises are staring down a multi-year patching backlog that runs from now until the end of time.

Non-technical teams in finance, ops, and HR are shipping internal tools using Replit and Claude, and almost none of them are securing what they build. Ryan Burke flagged the research: "vibe-coded software is almost 3 times as likely to have security issues." When the employee who built the agent quits, the agent stays behind with no owner, no documentation, and quiet access to systems it never should have had in the first place.

For founders eyeing an exit, security has joined revenue, IP, and hitting your numbers as a non-negotiable diligence pillar. As Ryan Burke explained: "lack of security can kill an acquisition...a fourth pillar now is you're secure." Acquirers like JPMorgan Chase will not buy a fintech startup that turns into a vector for attackers to walk straight into their environment.

The market case for NRR-fortress legacy SaaS may be weaker than the last decade made it look. As Asad Zaman, CEO of Sales Talent Agency, argued: "there was a generation of software companies that had signs that they had really good customer relationships...but their customers felt more like prisoners." If AI makes switching cheap and a new generation of software actually delights users, the moats around system-of-record incumbents start to compress fast.

Connect with the hosts and guest: Host: Sam Jacobs, CEO at Pavilion - https://www.linkedin.com/in/samfjacobs/

Host: AJ Bruno, CEO at QuotaPath - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajbruno3/ Host: Asad Zaman, CEO at Sales Talent Agency - https://www.linkedin.com/in/azaman1/

Guest: Ryan Burke, VP Worldwide Sales at Crogl - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-burke-bos/

Topline is more than a YouTube Channel:

Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://toplinemedia.substack.com/

Tune into Topline Podcast, the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-podcast

Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Chapters: 00:00 Introducing Ryan Burke 03:14 Anthropic Mythos and Cyber Risk 04:20 How Attackers Use AI at Scale 07:00 Dollar Menu Attacks Explained 10:41 AI for the Security Ops Center 14:53 Why Claude Tanks Figma's Stock 18:30 Sam's Advice on Falling Stocks 20:50 Are Legacy SaaS Companies Back? 24:04 The Vibe-Coding Risk Surface 27:56 Quiz Pro: Cybersecurity Edition 33:46 Replit Apps Inside Enterprises 40:18 Security as the M&A Fourth Pillar 44:17 Personal Data and Digital Legacy 47:24 Bulls vs Bears: Elon vs OpenAI 52:03 Will ServiceNow Hit $32B?

Stage 2 Capital General Partner Liz Christo joins the show to discuss the disconnect between venture expectations and reality in the software market. The conversation covers the hidden costs of the new build versus buy debate, the structural changes happening within modern sales organizations, and whether traditional B2B SaaS go-to-market strategies and moats still matter when AI coding tools make software replication cheaper than ever.

Key Takeaways:

-The shift toward building internal AI tools instead of buying SaaS products overlooks long-term technical debt, as Liz Christo points out that "there's like a huge amount of cost buried behind the scenes that we're not really talking about today because it's still like sexy and fun."

-Founders are artificially inflating their Total Addressable Market to meet new venture capital baseline expectations, with Liz Christo noting that "pitch decks read like really ridiculous right now where everybody wants to tell the story of like a $10 billion outcome because that's the new milestone that got set."

-Revenue Operations is becoming the most direct path to the Chief Revenue Officer seat in AI-first organizations, which Sam Jacobs explains is "because as we use fewer humans and more agents, the sort of the half technical, the semi-technical capabilities of most RevOps people will translate into orchestrating armies of agents."

-Delegating analysis and writing to AI risks destroying strategic judgment across go-to-market teams, a trend Liz Christo summarizes by stating, "I think we are producing an incredible amount of content that's not getting consumed... I just think we're like losing the ability to think and we're not teaching junior employees how to do it."

Connect with the Hosts & Guests:

Host: Sam Jacobs - https://www.linkedin.com/in/samfjacobs/

Host: AJ Bruno - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajbruno3/

Host: Asad Zaman - https://www.linkedin.com/in/azaman1/

Guest: Liz Christo - https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizchristo/

Topline is more than a YouTube Channel:

Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://toplinemedia.substack.com/ Tune into Topline Podcast, the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-podcast Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Chapters:

00:00 Intro and Cold Open

02:41 The New Build vs Buy Debate

06:10 Engineers in Every Department

10:48 Pitch Decks and 10B Dollar TAMs

17:53 Venture Capital Funding Quiz

23:43 AI Memos and Critical Thinking

42:41 Software Moats and Switching Costs

47:46 Bulls vs Bears Segment

48:23 RevOps as a Path to CRO

51:25 The Future of SDR Managers

55:14 Is Clay Actually Undervalued

59:12 Odds of Hitting 50M ARR

Peter Walker brings Carta's proprietary private market data from 60,000 startups and 85% of US unicorns to expose the brutal realities of today's tech landscape. While Q1 saw record capital raised, the money is highly concentrated among foundation models. We review the harsh truth behind the 530,000 open tech jobs in the US and the widening talent divide separating top 10% performers from the rest of the market. The conversation covers why venture capital is squeezing operators, how private equity is no longer a guaranteed exit strategy, and the urgent need to optimize your GTM strategy for AI-native workflows. We also debate the death of long-term product roadmaps, the impact of AI on enterprise pipeline generation, and evaluate whether middle management will survive the next 24 months.

Key Takeaways

• The traditional safety net for slow-growth SaaS companies has disappeared, with Peter Walker noting that "A lot of companies held out this PE route as like, this is my escape hatch if I don't grow that fast. And now they're finding it's like, actually, the PEs don't care about you either."

• Securing venture capital has never been harder for founders outside of the AI bubble, as Peter Walker states "it's definitely not the easiest time to raise money unless you are already in the legible cohort. And if you're in the legible cohort, you know who you are."

• Rapid execution is replacing traditional product planning, with Peter Walker emphasizing that "the companies that are moving fast… don't know what they're doing in three weeks... we have no idea what's going to happen in October."

• Artificial intelligence is fundamentally threatening traditional communication hierarchies, and Sam Jacobs is bearish on the future of people managers because "if the purpose of management is to facilitate decision making at certain executive levels, that is something that AI can do."

Connect with the Hosts & Guests

Host: Sam Jacobs - https://www.linkedin.com/in/samfjacobs/

Host: AJ Bruno - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajbruno3/

Host: Asad Zaman - https://www.linkedin.com/in/azaman1/

Guest: Peter Walker - https://www.linkedin.com/in/peterjameswalker/

Topline is more than a YouTube Channel!

Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://toplinemedia.substack.com/

Tune into Topline Podcast, the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-podcast

Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Chapters:

00:00 The AI Funding Divide

02:36 Is It Harder to Raise Capital

04:37 VCs Only Care About Growth

06:44 The Death of the PE Exit

10:48 Transitioning to AI Native

14:50 Why Product Roadmaps Are (Kinda) Dead

19:19 Stop Defaulting to VC

29:11 Historic Tech Funding Rounds

31:59 Over 530K Open Tech Jobs

36:55 Hiring Market Concentration

46:29 The Growing Tech Talent Divide

49:11 VC Fund Performance Realities

54:28 Future of Foundation Models

58:29 The End of Middle Management

In this episode, Jordan Crawford outlines how revenue leaders can build an autonomous pipeline generation engine and transition away from static playbooks. The discussion covers practical methods for extracting competitor usage data, identifying segments of users who are far more likely to buy, and generally how top GTM teams are using GTM Engineering to dramatically improve their results. The hosts also evaluate how AI tools alter revenue operations, shift the traditional B2B SaaS go-to-market strategy, and force a total redesign of traditional AE compensation models.

Key Takeaways:

Top-down executive mandates fail because leadership lacks hands-on experience with the required technical systems. Jordan Crawford notes the absurdity of this disconnect, stating, "You read these letters from all these CEOs and they're like, 'We need to be an AI first organization and I can't tell you what that means or how to implement it, but goddamn, you need to be able to do it.'"

The core function of revenue operations must shift from administrative reporting tasks to running active market tests. Sam Jacobs explains this organizational friction, observing many Rev Ops employees think their job is still to deliver reports to the C-Suite and ensure data accuracy, when today's reality is that "actually your job now is to generate demand and like I need 50 campaigns tested by tomorrow."

Identifying high-value target accounts requires prioritizing product telemetry and user actions over static CRM fields. Jordan highlights the power of this approach, explaining that "AI can basically analyze customers' words, actions, and what's in the CRM and say... these accounts are worth 10 times more than these accounts."

Connect with the Hosts & Guests:

Host: Sam Jacobs - https://www.linkedin.com/in/samfjacobs/

Host: AJ Bruno - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajbruno3/

Host: Asad Zaman - https://www.linkedin.com/in/azaman1/

Guest: Jordan Crawford - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jordancrawford/

Topline is more than a YouTube Channel:

Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-newsletter

Tune into Topline Podcast, the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-podcast J

Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Chapters:

00:00 Podcast Episode Introduction

02:52 Reversing GTM Strategy

06:44 RevOps and AI Thought Partners

13:58 Executing Fast Sales Campaigns

18:25 AI For Comp Plan Benchmarks

21:04 Defining Pain Qualified Segments

26:42 Shifting RevOps Priorities

38:41 Unbundling B2B SaaS Jobs

39:21 The Topline Trivia Game

45:11 Top Of Funnel AI Tactics

46:43 Middle Of Funnel Telemetry

47:56 Bottom Of Funnel Contract Review

49:10 Bull/Bear Predictions

Cassie Young, Partner at Primary Venture Partners, joins the show to break down their contrarian $625 million seed fund and the reality of the coming gross retention apocalypse for tech companies. The conversation outlines why classical venture logic is breaking and how AI-native CRMs are plotting to steal enterprise market share from legacy giants like Salesforce. The group also details why the $6 trillion white-collar labor pool is the real target for emerging AI workflows rather than traditional software budgets. Expect a direct discussion on the myth of the zero CAC CEO, the evolving definition of the jaw-dropping customer experience, and the specific signals Primary looks for when writing checks to early-stage go-to-market founders building the next wave of B2B SaaS products.

Key Takeaways

-Primary Ventures just raised a massive $625 million seed fund by challenging traditional venture capital models, as Cassie explains, "The conventional wisdom at seed is to stay small. We fundamentally disagree with that." But don't worry: Cassie explains why they believe their approach is the right one.

-Cassie warns that a retention reckoning is inevitable for AI startups noting, "I still very much live in fear of this... it might not be next month, it might not be next year, but it's ultimately going to come." Meanwhile, the hosts wonder: is it truly inevitable? Or just highly likely?

-Cassie points out that a "Zero CAC CEO who's not supplemented by amazing technologists, it's just not enough." And that's just one of the many classic competitive moats which Cassie flags as reducing in value.

-Asad highlights how rapid AI advancements are forcing companies to continuously rethink their competitive moats and sales motions, stating, "There are no product advantages that are long-lasting anymore."

Connect with the Hosts & Guests

Host: Sam Jacobs - https://www.linkedin.com/in/samfjacobs/

Host: AJ Bruno - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajbruno3/

Host: Asad Zaman - https://www.linkedin.com/in/azaman1/

Guest: Cassie Young - https://www.linkedin.com/in/cassyoung/

Topline is more than a YouTube Channel:

Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-newsletter

Tune into Topline Podcast, the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-podcast

Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Chapters:

00:00 Cassie Young Joins Topline

04:37 Raising a $625M Seed Fund

08:08 How Primary Wins Seed Deals

12:56 The 6 Trillion AI Opportunity

19:04 Can AI CRMs Beat Salesforce

29:14 Gross Retention Apocalypse

40:12 Myth of the Zero CAC CEO

46:58 Eradicating Switching Costs

53:15 Backing Go-to-Market Founders

Kyle Norton's AI-enabled revenue team at Owner.com has completely rewritten the economics of what's possible in sales. Kyle joins the show to share why decentralized AI rollouts fail, how to build a core intelligence engine centrally, and why early AI investments must focus on one specific area. The hosts also discuss navigating go-to-market strategy shifts, rethinking RevOps AI integration, and why sales leadership can no longer use budget constraints to delay AI adoption.

Key Takeaways:

-Building a highly functional AI go-to-market strategy requires a perfect mapping of your entire market and deep enrichment, as Kyle Norton notes to "start with data... without that, nothing really works because you can't give the models what they need to make smart decisions or give you good outputs."

-Pushing individual reps to build their own AI workflows yields poor results compared to building central intelligence, which is why Kyle Norton realized that "all of the best things, all of the most impactful implementations were all highly centralized... you just get a completely different result out of it and you can properly enable your whole org to adopt it."

-Companies looking to see immediate ROI from their AI investments need to direct their resources toward the top of the funnel, with Kyle Norton emphasizing that "80% of your AI efforts in your early innings should be pipeline focused... AI is a really good pipeline tool."

Connect with the Hosts & Guests:

Host: Sam Jacobs - https://www.linkedin.com/in/samfjacobs/

Host: AJ Bruno - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajbruno3/

Host: Asad Zaman - https://www.linkedin.com/in/azaman1/

Guest: Kyle Norton - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kylecnorton/

Topline is more than a YouTube Channel:

Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-newsletter

Tune into Topline Podcast, the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-podcast

Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Chapters:

00:00 - Introduction

04:05 - Data Foundations for Sales AI

08:14 - Predicting Lead Connect Rates

10:05 - Centralized AI Rollout Strategy

17:20 - Building the Intelligence Engine

22:05 - AI Investments for Startups

28:12 - Changing Comp Plans Quarterly

33:58 - Centralizing AI by Department

37:35 - The Five Ps Decision Framework

39:33 - Focusing AI on Pipeline Gen

43:16 - Salesforce Acquisition Strategy

45:24 - The Reality of Founder Mode

48:01 - The Next Phase of AI Workflows

Kevin Bailey, CEO of Dreamfuel, joins Kyle Norton to break down exactly how to manage executive physiology and eliminate inconsistent performance.

Mastering your mental state is the ultimate go-to-market tool for navigating high-stakes sales motions and enterprise pipeline generation without burning out. This episode breaks down the applied neuroscience of executive performance, giving GTM leaders the exact tools to regulate their nervous systems and execute flawlessly under pressure.

Kevin mentioned a few resources during the show, linked below:

• Tech Leader Mental Performance Report & Field Guide - A deep dive into tech leader mental performance challenges, frameworks, and tools. Created in partnership with Indiana University and Elevate Ventures

• Weekly Tech Leader Breathwork Session - Weekly group breathwork session hosted on Thursdays at 9 PT / Noon ET

• Complimentary 1:1 Mental Performance Coaching Session - Apply for an individual session with a Dreamfuel mental performance coach

Other helpful links:

🎧 Tune into Topline Podcast (our other show!), the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-podcast

📩 Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-newsletter

🤝 Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Books mentioned in the episode:

Search Inside Yourself by Chade-Meng Tan

The Comfort Crisis by Michael Easter

The Greatest Secret by Rhonda Byrne

Effortless Being by David Bingham

Atomic Habits by James Clear

Chop Wood Carry Water by Joshua Medcalf

The Untethered Soul by Michael A. Singer

The Secret by Rhonda Byrne

Key Takeaways

• Consistency defines elite performance: Top executives don't just rely on good days. They train their nervous systems to maintain a tight baseline of peak output regardless of external stress or market conditions.

• Results are downstream of biology: You cannot out-think a biological threat response. Shifting your physical state through breathwork or cold exposure is the absolute prerequisite for changing your emotions, cognition, and ultimate business results.

• Prime your subconscious with imagery: Treat high-stakes meetings like an athletic event. Using rehearsal visualization to run through potential objections primes your brain to respond calmly and constructively in the moment.

• Cut cheap dopamine: Endless scrolling and easy distractions drain the motivation required for deep work. Eliminating dopamine wasters reallocates that drive directly into your professional execution and resilience.

Chapters:

00:00 Intro & The Cost of Startup Growth

06:17 Defining Elite Executive Performance

09:30 The Neuroscience Performance Chain

13:47 Taming Stress (feat. Default Mode Network)

16:23 Four States of the Nervous System

20:50 Practicing Somatic Awareness

28:00 Building Resilience With Cold Plunges

33:57 Finding Equanimity in Leadership

40:46 Warmups for High-Stakes Meetings

44:35 Rehearsal and Creative Visualization

57:51 Holding Form Under Intense Pressure

67:20 Cooling Down With Anger Journaling

75:00 Understanding Non-Duality at Work

84:00 Modeling Behavior for Your Team

89:52 Eliminating Dopamine Wasters

Amanda Kahlow raised $30 million to build AI sales agents that improve the buying experience. As the founder of 1mind and previously 6sense, she sits at the forefront of modern go to market strategy. In this episode, Sam Jacobs, AJ Bruno, and Asad Zaman sit down with Amanda to discuss the reality of AI in the sales motion; she explains how Superhumans (1mind's AI Agents) handle everything from top of funnel enterprise pipeline generation to acting as sales engineers on live demos. The conversation covers the technical hurdles of building high performing AI agents, why she believes buyers will soon demand to interact with AI over human sellers, and what revenue leaders must do to prepare their teams for a radically different future.

Key Takeaways:

• According to Amanda, the speed and accuracy of application specific AI will soon eclipse traditional human selling, as Amanda Kahlow predicts that "When buyers realize their answer is going to be more accurate and more empathetic, they're going to demand to talk to an AI over a human."

• The traditional role of the sales representative is facing total disruption, and Amanda Kahlow states clearly that in the future "I don't think there will be sellers... I think the best thing we can do for sellers and for the market right now is to be f***ing honest about what is coming for them."

• Product development for revenue technology must prioritize the end customer over internal efficiency, a philosophy Amanda Kahlow emphasizes by noting that "If I can create a better buying experience, I believe the rest will fall into place... if that's not a better buying experience, I want to be a hard no to it."

Connect with the Hosts & Guests:

Host: Sam Jacobs - https://www.linkedin.com/in/samfjacobs/

Host: AJ Bruno - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajbruno3/

Host: Asad Zaman - https://www.linkedin.com/in/azaman1/

Guest: Amanda Kahlow - https://www.linkedin.com/in/amandakahlow/

Topline is more than a Podcast:

Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-newsletter

Tune into Topline on YouTube, the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.youtube.com/@TOPLINE-Media

Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Chapters (Audio Version):

01:00 Introducing Amanda Kahlow and 1mind

02:27 What are Go To Market Superhumans?

06:50 Managing AI Latency and Models

09:53 AI: More Trustworthy Than Human Sellers

15:40 Building the Future of GTM Tech

22:25 The Next Three Years of GTM

35:16 Closing Six Figure Enterprise Deals

40:01 Will Sales Reps Exist in Two Years?

50:00 Collapsing the Sales Assembly Line

54:08 Adapting to the AI Sales Era

58:36 The Autonomous Context Graph Future

Intercom gave up $60 million in contracted seat-based ARR to bet the entire company on an AI agent named Fin. The result? They passed $400 million in total ARR, with Fin driving over $100 million in revenue and 35% growth. In this episode, Sam Jacobs, AJ Bruno, and Asad Zaman break down what went into this massive turnaround. The conversation starts with the problem: the SaaS market cap dropping by $600 billion, and how this creates an urgent need for structural pivots. The hosts discuss the financial reality of agentic business models, why historic 90% SaaS gross margins are disappearing, and how scaling compute costs will impact your GTM strategy. The episode wraps up with tactical advice on managing board support, handling leadership pushback, and executing a burn-the-boats transition before your legacy product-market fit evaporates.

Link to Intercom CEO Eoghan McCabe's essay: https://ideas.fin.ai/p/there-is-exactly-one-way-that-saas

Key Episode Takeaways:

- Shifting to an AI-first product fundamentally changes your financial model, requiring exponential revenue generation to offset massive compute costs, which Sam Jacobs points out by stating, "You are trading a good business for a worse business... you have to grow at exponential rates as an agentic business because your gross margins are so much lower than SaaS."

- Comfort is the enemy of innovation for established software companies, and survival often requires a massive operational reset, as AJ Bruno explains when noting that "Intercom had five straight quarters of zero net new ARR growth" before they took drastic action.

- The cost of human capital is rising as top performers require heavy compute access to execute their roles effectively, a reality Asad Zaman highlights by predicting that "Every recruiter at STA will probably have $10K, $20K, $30K worth of inference calls in the next couple of years... That's like a mini assistant for each person."

Connect with the Hosts:

Host: Sam Jacobs - https://www.linkedin.com/in/samfjacobs/

Host: AJ Bruno - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajbruno3/

Host: Asad Zaman - https://www.linkedin.com/in/azaman1/

Topline is more than a YouTube Channel:

-Subscribe to Topline Newsletter: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-newsletter

-Tune into Topline Podcast, the #1 podcast for founders, operators, and investors in B2B tech: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-podcast

-Join the free Topline Slack channel to connect with 600+ revenue leaders to keep the conversation going beyond the podcast: https://www.joinpavilion.com/topline-slack

Chapters:

00:00 Intro and Episode Overview

01:21 Intercom 400M ARR Turnaround

03:41 The Massive SaaS Market Cap Reset

05:27 Executing a Burn the Boats Pivot

09:05 Gross Margins of AI vs Legacy SaaS

12:00 Defending App Commoditization

18:16 Returning to Founder Mode

27:29 Why You Need Full Board Support

32:26 The Danger of Comfortable Growth

36:31 The Real Cost of AI Inference

42:27 Rising Talent Compute Economics

49:25 Tracking the Right Churn Metrics

52:38 Shifting GTM to Vertical SaaS