SaaS (Software as a Service) is all of the rage in the start-up world. Investors love the recurring revenue stream, and companies are beginning to love the ease of deploy and the low upfront cost for deployments.

But what is not always realized is that SaaS really needs a human component as a start-up software company. A recent interaction at one of our portfolio companies really demonstrates this. The first part of the email is a member of the start-up’s management team talking about the importance of human interaction. The second part is an email from an actual customer. NOTE: All names have been removed.

Manager’s Email:

Hello All:

As you all may or may not know, at least every 3 months every one of our customers gets a contact email and/or phone call from their account manager. From these calls, we learn a great number of things and re-enforce our relationship.

I wanted to pass on this great email to demonstrate why this is so important. XXXXXXXXXXXXXX was doing his usual account maintenance and got the response below. The customer mentions an obvious product deficiency, (NOTE: We hear this from at least 90% of the customers we speak to), but also mentions that our customer service is second to none.

Often, the human touch can overcome any product shortcoming. It is good to know that we have instilled a culture where the “Service” part of SaaS is executed upon.

Customer’s Email:

Hi XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX,

Thank you for your email, it’s nice to know that when we purchase a product from a company such as yours that we actually get to deal with real people, and not automated computers!

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX has done wonders for our school – more and more teachers are starting to use them for their course work and also to collaborate planning sessions amongst staff members as well as parents. We use them in a variety of ways, from course work, to an online newspaper, to parents signing up for interview times and, as I mentioned, teachers planning lessons with other specialists whom they may not get a chance to do so otherwise.

At the moment I don’t really have any queries, only a suggestion… Is it possible in the near future that INSERT FEATURE REQUEST will be completed? Just a query