Salesloft’s $50 Million Series C: Investing in the #1 Sales Engagement Platform

It’s a big day for customers of Salesloft. Today we’re announcing our $50 million Series C investment from Insight Venture Partners, Emergence Capital, and LinkedIn.

The capital will be deployed by Salesloft to activate the authenticity in every seller, and enable companies around the world to deliver the best sales experience to their customers.

I’m including the release below and want to make a few comments outside the official press here:

Why Has This New Category Emerged?

There is no shortage of evidence on how buying has changed. Customers are more empowered and informed than ever before. This has upped the ante for sellers who will try anything to get through to buyers. Unfortunately, these attempts often resort in a high volume of insincere tactics, leaving buyers inundated with phone calls, emails, social, and other sales actions. But the buyers’ problems don’t go away. In fact, they are getting more complex, and the solutions they need are evolving as well. Buyers find themselves looking for trusted advice and yearn for their sellers to rise above all the noise and deliver them with a better sales experience.

A better sales experience is measured by the customer, not the seller.

It’s one that is empathetic, solution-oriented, relevant, and human. Yet companies need growth and scale to fulfill their missions. This means they need a better sales process as well. A better sales process is one that’s scalable, automated (at times), and steeped in science and procedure. Businesses able to harmoniously blend the sincere and authentic side of sales with the process-oriented and scalable science of sales, win. This is our ethos. These needs have led to the emergence of the category of sales engagement. We’re excited to steward the leadership of this movement.

As Sales Engagement Has Grown, So Have We. And It’s Working.

Over the last two years, Salesloft has experienced an 800 percent increase in sales. We were recently ranked the 7th Fastest Growing Company in North America (according to Deloitte), and along the way, we’ve been able to serve the best companies in the world in their missions to boost sales.

With real sales data, we measured 1000 customers, 90 days before and 90 days after they implemented Salesloft Sales Engagement, and we found an average of 36 percent increase in opportunities created, leading to more growth and more sales. Companies like Square, Cisco, MuleSoft, Intercom, and Dell are powered by Salesloft to boost their sales and deliver their customers with a better sales experience.

A New Category Means New Innovation

Salesloft's innovation in sales engagement has been rapid, with more than 120 releases in the past year alone. Today, our customers can take their complex go-to-market strategies and codify them into Salesloft. The system then deploys to each and any customer-facing sales or account manager, holding them accountable to all the sales activities from their process. It delivers insights and information on buyers and accounts at the point of communication, and uses data and insights to suggest the next best step and improve the process.

Last month, we released research and insights based on our analysis of more than 200 million sales activities in search of the most effective cadence. And at Rainmaker, we announced our easy to understand AI capability, Salesloft Assist, which recommends best sales activities and cadence structures to engage more of your buyer’s attention and time.

This is just the beginning. Our $50 million raise will be used to out-innovate, and outdeliver all other companies in our category, so we can best serve our customers in their mission to serve theirs.

Why These Investors?

The investment is led by Insight Venture Partners, one of the top global venture capital and private equity firms in the world. They’ve raised more than $18 billion and invested in over 300 companies worldwide, including BMC, Twitter, Qualtrics, Smartsheet, and Yext. Insight brings us wisdom and resources to build a customer-first platform that drives transformative change in our industry.

We also added new investor, LinkedIn to the round. Salesloft is one of the top partner integrations of LinkedIn’s Sales Navigator Application Platform (SNAP) and looking forward to continuing our innovation together with LinkedIn.

THANK YOU

Even though I’m the CEO of Salesloft, I learned a big lesson a long time ago that this is not my company. It’s our customers’ and community members’, it’s our investors’ & partners’, it’s our team members’. It’s our families’ and those who support us. It’s your company.

It’s my pledge to serve and support all of you with the first and best platform designed to deliver a better sales experience to your customers. Thank you to all of you who make this possible.

With #saleslove, Kyle

Press Release:

SALESLOFT RAISES $50 MILLION SERIES C TO FUEL INNOVATION OF CATEGORY LEADING SALES ENGAGEMENT PLATFORM

Company to Deliver AI and Open Platform in Response to Rising Market Demand For Its Sales Engagement Platform

ATLANTA -- April 3, 2018 -- Salesloft, the sales engagement platform on a mission to help authentic sellers deliver the best sales experience, today announced it has raised $50 million in its Series C round, bringing total funding to $75 million. Insight Venture Partners led the round with participation from LinkedIn, and Series A and B investor Emergence Capital.

In recent years, the company quickly emerged as the sales engagement category leader, growing sales by more than 800 percent in the past two years alone, and being named the 7th fastest-growing technology company in North America by Deloitte. Along the way, Salesloft expanded its team to more than 220 employees and has built a company culture that has earned it recognition as the #1 best place to work in Atlanta. The growth and accolades are the results of the relentless platform innovation which balances the authentic, human side of sales with the scalable, scientific side of sales.

“Things have gotten very noisy for buyers these days. They are bombarded with sales activity via phone, email, social, and many other channels,” says Kyle Porter, Co-Founder and CEO, Salesloft. “When buyers are able to peel away from those distractions, they still have problems to solve — and an overwhelming range of solutions to sift through. Now more than ever, buyers really need sellers who can rise above all this noise and provide them with a better sales experience — through our product innovation and our people, it’s our mission to help sellers do just that.”

Looking ahead, the company will continue platform innovation, including the highly anticipated launch of its Salesloft Assist offering, the category’s first true artificial intelligence (A.I.) capability — which is informed by more than 500 million sales interactions, providing users with dynamic and real-time suggestions. Salesloft has opened its platform and plans to aggressively expand its developer community and partner ecosystems, including a recently launched app marketplace of more than 30 available integration providers.

One popular integration option on its sales engagement platform is through LinkedIn’s Sales Navigator, where Salesloft is one of the top partner integrations of LinkedIn’s Sales Navigator Application Platform (SNAP).

"Salesloft is one of the most innovative companies in the sales engagement category and a leading provider on the Sales Navigator Application Platform,” said Doug Camplejohn, VP of Product, Sales Solutions, LinkedIn. “Salesloft has integrated Sales Navigator into their application in a way that provides great user value while protecting LinkedIn member data. We look forward to working with Salesloft to create even more value for our joint customers in the future.”

With this new investment and innovation, Salesloft plans to add over 200 employees across Atlanta headquarters, San Francisco, New York, and Europe. The company intends to continue developing innovative solutions for its commercial and enterprise customers.

Salesloft has more than 2,000 customers — including Square, Cisco, MuleSoft, Alteryx, and Dell — who are boosting sales by delivering better experiences to their customers. In fact, Salesloft recently shared the results of a study where it analyzed customer performance 90 days prior to and 90 days following their implementations and found an average of a 36 percent increase in opportunities created.

“We didn’t create the sales engagement category; our customers did,” adds Porter. “They weren’t satisfied with the tools their teams had to connect and engage buyers. They made their needs clear, and we listened. As a result, sales engagement has evolved from a point solution to the system of record for sales organizations. Users are spending more time within Salesloft than any other technology, including their CRM. Our customers are leading the way in this exciting new category, which is really just a reflection of their efforts to serve their customers in new, authentic ways.”

"Sales engagement has emerged as the fastest-growing area in the sales and marketing stack," said Jeff Horing, Co-Founder and Managing Director, Insight Venture Partners. "And for good reason: it works. Salesloft consistently helps customers increase their pipelines, but also strengthen their relationships with buyers — that's a huge differentiator. We're looking forward to partnering with Salesloft on their mission to activate authentic sellers and help them deliver better sales experience for the customers they serve."

This latest investment comes 15 months after the company announced its $16M Series B. In that time, the company has increased annual recurring revenue by over 150% and significantly expanded its platform in four primary areas: automated workflows, CRM integration, connected apps, and enterprise security.

To learn more about employment opportunities with Salesloft, please visit the company’s Careers and Job Openings portal here.