With so many marketing channels competing for consumers’ attention, it has become very difficult for revenue-generating teams to determine what triggered buyers’ initial interest and this can lead to wasted ad spend and even loss of potential sales. 1sm addresses this problem through its revenue operations platform that bridges the gap in communication between marketing and sales teams. 1sm provides a unified, in-depth knowledge sharing dashboard that connects buying patterns and trends centered on ideal customer profiles, allowing all stakeholders to effectively collaborate by sharing information. 1sm natively integrates with sales, advertising, and marketing platforms already in a company’s stack like Salesforce, Google Ads, and Kustomer to power the data.
AlleyWatch caught up with CEO and Cofounder James Weitzman to learn more about how 1sm acts as the single source of truth for marketing, sales, and revenue-generating teams, the company’s expansion plans, and recent fundraise in the midst of the pandemic. 1sm is currently participating in the Techstars 2020 NYC accelerator program, which launched this week.
Who were your investors and how much did you raise?
We raised a Pre-Seed funding round of $375K with participation from Jenny Fielding (Managing Director at Techstars), Tim Geisenheimer (Founder & COO at Facet Data), Michael Ruskin (COO at Jetson), and Josh Dunham (VP, Partnerships & Business Development at Life Happens), along with senior executives and angels from Oracle, Okta, mParticle, Pitchbook, BlueCrest Capital Management, and The Venture Center.
Tell us about the product or service that 1sm offers.
1sm integrates with CRMs, Marketing Automation Platforms, Digital Advertising Platforms, Outbound Sales Tools, Customer Support & Live Chat tools and more, allowing sales, marketing, and revenue operations teams to efficiently collaborate online and get insights no other platform can offer.
Our algorithm connects buying patterns and trends centered on people with the same job titles, who work in the same industries, locations, at similar sized companies and more to keywords or key phrases that drive action across sales and marketing content.
What inspired the start of 1sm?
After dealing with this problem first-hand for years and coming across a study that shows almost half of the time marketing leads, from a content perspective, are misappropriated – 50% of the time sellers aren’t informed about what the prospect showed interest in leading to bad calls and lost deals. I decided to start 1sm.
How is 1sm different?
We are the only Revenue Operations Analytics Platform, the first of its kind, allowing sales and marketing teams to collaborate through data for the first time, the way they should in the digital, omnichannel world.
What market does 1sm target and how big is it?
The three markets we play in are:
- CRM, which has a $41B TAM, with a 14% CAGR
- Business Intelligence, which has a $21.6B TAM, with a 11.7% CAGR
- Predictive Analytics, which has a $5.9B TAM, but is growing rapidly with a 23.2% CAGR.
We target B2B sales, marketing and revenue operations teams.
What’s your business model?
We’re in private beta right now, but 1sm will have a freemium version of the platform, growth-stage company based pricing and enterprise pricing.
How has COVID-19 impacted the business?
COVID itself has presented many challenges that are far more important than our business. When it comes to 1sm, COVID has actually positively impacted our business as it allows sales and marketing teams to collaborate online and in one platform. In the past, revenue-generating teams collaborated offline and in-person, while balancing an average of 18 different software solutions. We allow for this collaboration to happen online, through data in today’s remote world, through our single source of truth.
What was the funding process like?
To be honest, the fundraising process was very tough at the beginning of COVID. Funds had to focus on portfolio support and didn’t know how to value startups during a pandemic. That’s why we chose to go the Techstars route, as we believe the VC world will be closer to normal after the program, and we were fortunate enough to raise enough money to have 34 months of runway.
What are the biggest challenges that you faced while raising capital?
Aside from Corona, I found that many VC’s who claimed to be open for business weren’t actually open for business. Revenue Operations is a new space, and as a category-creating company, I think VC’s were trying to be as risk-averse as possible, as category-creating companies can be confusing to understand at first.
What factors about your business led your investors to write the check?
Our investors firmly believe that B2B sales and marketing teams are terrible at working together. Even the funds that expressed interest but wanted to hold off until they had a better understanding of the implications of COVID, fully bought our mission that sales, marketing, and revenue-generating teams need a single source of truth as collaboration between the two departments isn’t done efficiently or effectively today.
What are the milestones you plan to achieve in the next six months?
Raise a seed round, grow our customer base and hire out a killer team, while focusing on diversity and company culture.
What advice can you offer companies in New York that do not have a fresh injection of capital in the bank?
Take every dollar you can get. Especially now during COVID. It’s a great time to start a company as many people are less busy than normal, making it easier to connect with venture capitalists and angel investors.
It’s a great time to start a company as many people are less busy than normal, making it easier to connect with venture capitalists and angel investors.
Make sure you believe in your mission statement and let investors see how passionate you are about solving whatever problem it is you are trying to solve.
Where do you see the company going now over the near term?
I see us becoming a must-have tool for revenue-generating teams because we help sales teams to shorten the sales cycle, secure more meetings, and close deals. We also help marketing teams iterate on content faster than ever while helping them cut their ad spend by 10x because our algorithm determines what ad platforms to target based on the data we provide.
What’s your favorite outdoor dining restaurant in NYC
It’s hard to pick one as I have a few – I’m a big fan of Bar Primi, Gallow Green, Pier I Café, and Rosie’s. I will say the outdoor Shake Shack in Madison Square Park and its proximity to my old office, when I worked at Cockroach Labs, was terrible for my health.
