#sales chat channel for general questions and follow the #field-fyi read-only channel for important updates and announcements related to the field team.Tools that you will use in your day to day workflow, to see a complete list &/or for Contact/Admin details please see full tech stack table on the Business OPS page.
See the GitLab org chart.
Reporting into the Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) are the:
The people working with each segment and their quota are:
In advance of a SAL being promoted to an ASM, the SAL may choose as holdovers for 3 months from their promotion effective date opportunities which are greater than or equal to all of the following Salesforce opportunity characteristics: $100k IACV, Stage 3, 50% Probability, provided that the opportunity attributes are established in good faith. The holdover accounts must first be approved by the VP, Enterprise Sales and then documented with Sales Operations no later than the promotion effective date. The new ASM is expected to spend less than 25% of their time as an ASM managing the holdover accounts and is required to proactively incorporate the receiving SAL into the account so the transition is minimally disruptive to the account and maximizes GitLab’s opportunity to best serve the customer. Each individual holdover account will be fully transitioned to the receiving SAL on the opportunity close date (won or lost), 3 months following the promotion effective date, or upon the new ASM’s discretion, whichever comes first. Any opportunity which meets the listed qualifications and is closed won during the holdover period will result in commission credit to the ASM equal to the commission they would have received under their most recent SAL compensation plan. There will be no additional stacked ASM payout, although it will retire ASM quota. The receiving SAL will receive no quota or commission credit.
sales agenda in Google Drive.For a full overview of the QBR planning and execution process, QBR request tracking, best-practices for organizers and attendees, and where to find past QBR content, see here.
The Field team is piloting Focus Fridays through the end of August 2020. The goal is to encourage all field team members to clear out their calendars on Fridays as much as possible in hopes that this will help all of us be more efficient, allow space within our weeks for focused work, and reduce potential burnout. Guidance for Focus Fridays includes:
You are encouraged to talk to your manager for guidance on how best to embrace Focus Fridays on your team and with your individual schedule.
Executive Cadence: Forecasts are summarized weekly in Clari and shared formally in the Revenue Meeting or asynchronously on weeks that meeting does not take place. Pipeline, deal status, next steps and account plans should always be current. Dashboards and reports based on SFDC are considered current at any time.
Team Cadence: The Regional Director/Vice President of each team will establish weekly due date/time for your forecasts submissions. The RD/VP will be responsible for using your data for forecast the following:
(Note that the above requires Renewal Loss to be forecasted)
Please watch the following videos on how to submit your IACV forecast and your Renewal ACV forecast. The following sections provide you with additional information on our forecasting methodologies and practices.
Command Plan:
Command Plan:
Forecast Category will be used when forecasting any opportunity with Incremental IACV. For example, if you are submitting a New Business, Add On Business, or Renewal opportunity to your forecast, the IACV portion of the opportunity will be included in your number.
Churn Renewal will be used only when forecasting any renewal opportunities that have a probability to churn. In these cases, the Renewal ACV portion of the deal will be included into your Renewal Loss forecast number.
| Opportunity Stage | Default Forecast Category | Default Churn Renewal |
|---|---|---|
| 00-Pre Opportunity | Omitted | N/A |
| 0-Pending Acceptance | Omitted | N/A |
| 1-Discovery | Pipeline | N/A |
| 2-Scoping | Pipeline | N/A |
| 3-Technical Evaluation | Pipeline | N/A |
| 4-Proposal | Best Case | N/A |
| 5-Negotiating | Commit | N/A |
| 6-Awaiting Signature | Commit | N/A |
| 7-Closing | Commit | N/A |
| Closed Won | Closed | Closed |
| 8-Closed Lost | Omitted | Commit |
| 9-Unqualified | Omitted | N/A |
| 10-Duplicate | Omitted | N/A |
There are two types of categories we review when your forecasts are pushed to Clari:
Please use these terms correctly and don't introduce other words. Apart from the above the company uses two other terms:
Early in a quarter, you may not have many opportunities in Stage 4 and beyond (Best Case and up). With that in mind, you will have the ability to override the Forecast Category and Renewal Forecast Category for your opportunities in both Salesforce and Clari. Note: this does not apply to Commercial SMB and Mid-Market forecasting.
In Salesforce, go to the Opportunities Home tab:
In Clari, you will update records individually via Opportunity tab:
Credit splits are allowed at an opportunity level and can be requested by native-quota carrying salespeople. Opportunity splits must be requested before any work is shared on an opportunity and approved prior to the closed won date. Opportunity splits must be documented in Chatter on the opportunity and require approval from Regional Director and VP. Under no circumstances will double compensation (more than 100% of deal value) on the same deal will be allowed.
Sales Team To request an opportunity split, a sales rep should indicate the split in Chatter, tag the ASM(s), RD(s), and VP(s) for each rep for approval, and tag Sales Support to make the update once approved. Opportunity splits should be requested before any work is shared on the opportunity.
SalesOps Team On receiving an approved request for the split, SalesOps team will update the Opportunity Splits section of the opportunity with the split details. On completion SalesOps team will cc Commissions team and Clari team to process these splits in the systems accordingly.
**CaptivateIQ Opportunity split crediting will automatically be calculated in the commissions system through the Opportunity Splits section. The Commissions team will ensure that the commissions are calculated accurately based on the split % and confirm in Chatter on the opportunity.
Clari Currently, our Clari instance does not support Opportunity Splits, so credit will be based on Opportunity Owner (this will not impact compensation). We are looking to enable this feature by FY21Q2.
In Clari, we have provided a simplified layout meaning that we have designed the Details tab to include the most important fields that an RD/VP will review when determining whether they will include your opportunity in their regional forecast. Purchasing Plan, MEDDPPICC, Next Steps are atop this simplified layout. You won’t have to navigate through various sections of Salesforce to enter the most important details. What's more is that sales leadership will use this exact same view when reviewing your opportunities. So while you might be more familiar with updating opportunity records in Salesforce, over time, you should find updating in Clari will prove much more convenient.
The following instructional videos are located on the GitLab unfiltered YouTube channel as private videos. If you have trouble viewing these videos please refer to this page on how to access GitLab unfiltered.
If you are a Sales Leader, will have additional access to the Forecasting Tab in Clari. You will see four tabs:
On the right of each tab, you will see a Toggle Details button. You can click on this to expand the list of opportunities in the selected forecast category. You will have three options:
Click on the radio button for the type of opportunities you want to see (normally for forecasting calls with AEs, you will select “Open”). Then click “View Deals” to go to a full list of opportunities.
To overwrite your regional forecast:
The following instructional videos are located on the GitLab unfiltered YouTube channel as private videos. If you have trouble viewing these videos please refer to this page on how to access GitLab unfiltered.
To allow our finance and analytics team to better understand the potential in our Total Landed Market (LAM or Customer Base), we ask that sales team members enter the total number of potential developers in their top 10 accounts by CARR.
Potential Users Verify field on the account. Note this should be for that individual account, not its entire hierarchy.
More info can be found hereWe define the number of customers as the number of accounts with a unique account identifier for which we have an active subscription in the period indicated. Users of our free trials or tier are not included in our customer count. A single organization with multiple divisions, segments or subsidiaries is generally counted as a single customer.
A First Order customer is a customer within an Account Family that makes the first subscription order for the Account Family in the period.
We define customers in the following categorical level of detail:
Ultimate Parent Account field)Because "customer" can have three different meanings whenever customer is used in presenting data it must be qualified by the type of customer. The default description is parent. When the default is used no further description is required. When account or subscription is being reported then the title or field description on the chart must be added to call out the basis for reporting. Metrics that are based on customer data should also carry a clarifying description. For clarity parent will be the only customer type used for external reporting.
A connected new customer is the first new subscription order with an Account that is related to an existing customer Account Family (regardless of relative position in corporate hierarchy) and the iACV related to this new customer is considered "Connected New".
Customer segmentation follows the segmentation as laid out in the Business Operations Handbook at the Parent Account level.
If an account was active at any point in time during the proposed timeframe it is counted as active. For example, an account that is active from March 2019 to May 2019 but is inactive from June 2019-on is counted for CY2019, FY2020 (which runs from February 2019-January 2020), FY20-Q1, and FY20-Q2; it is not counted in FY20-Q3 or FY20-Q4.
GitLab defines ARR as the annual run-rate revenue of subscription agreements from all customers in a given month. GitLab calculates ARR by taking the monthly recurring revenue, or MRR, and multiplying it by 12. MRR for each month is calculated by aggregating, for all customers during that month, monthly revenue from committed contractual amounts of subscriptions. ARR and MRR should be viewed independently of revenue, and do not represent GitLab's GAAP revenue on a monthly or annualized basis, as they are operating metrics that can be impacted by contract start and end dates and renewal rates. ARR and MRR are not intended to be replacements or forecasts of revenue. ARR and MRR calculates subscription fees normalized to a monthly value, and does not include one-time or usage fees.
Monthly recurring revenue from subscriptions that are active from all customers in a given month.
The average amount of annualized IACV a native quota carrying sales rep produces in a given month formula: (IACV / # of native quota carrying reps adjusted for ramp time) * 12 months. See Quota Ramp
The IACV used in this calculation only includes opportunities owned by quota carrying sales reps (not by a manager, director, or VP). Additionally, opportunities that represent web portal purchases are split out separately.
The primary metric when measuring rep productivity for only for quota attainment but also for compensation is the Gross Incremental Annual Contract Value (Gross IACV). Is is important to remember that while renewals are not a part of comp or quota attainment, renewing customers is still very important aspect of our business.
Rep Productivity is defined as IACV divided by the number of reps of a particular type (i.e. SAL, MM AEs, SMB Customer Advocates). Web portal purchases are split out separately.
Another measured KPI is Rep Productivity (as defined above) divided by On Target Income.
IACV per won deal. This metric can be reported against various dimensions (e.g. ASP by customer segment, cohort, sales channel, territory, etc.)
Value of all bookings from new and existing customers that will result in recurring revenue over the next 12 months less any credits, lost renewals, downgrades or any other decrease to annual recurring revenue. Excluded from ACV are bookings that are non-recurring such as professional services, training and non-recurring engineering fees (PCV).
Value of new bookings from new and existing customers that will result in recurring revenue over the next 12 months less any credits, lost renewals, downgrades or any other decrease to annual recurring revenue. Excluded from IACV are bookings that are non-recurring such as professional services, training and non-recurring engineering fees (PCV). Also equals ACV less renewals. However, bookings related to true-up licenses, although non-recurring, are included in IACV because the source of the true-ups are additional users which will result in recurring revenue. IACV may relate to future periods (within twelve months).
IACV can be calculated by adding First Order IACV + Connected New IACV + Growth IACV.
Beginning ARR + IACV may not equal ending ARR due to the following reasons:
End ARR - Beginning ARR (Delta ARR) = iACV - [True Ups] + [Coterm difference] +/- [Timing difference]
The final IACV value comes from the Net_IACV field in the Salesforce opportunities table.
Incremental IACV can be calculated for new and add on business in the following ways:
| Type | Opportunity Term | Amount/TCV | Incremental ACV | Explanation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New Business | 12 months | $120,000 | $120,000 | New customer signs for less than or equal to 12 months is IACV. |
| New Business | 24 months | $240,000 | $120,000 | New customer signs up for 24 months, so while Amount/TCV is $240,000, only the first 12 months counts towards IACV. |
| Add On Business | 5 months | $40,000 | $40,000 | Existing customer signs for less than or equal to 12 months is IACV. |
| Add On Business | 16 months | $16,000 | $12,000 | Existing customer signs for more than 12 months, so while Amount/TCV is for the entire 16 months at $16,000, only the first 12 months counts towards IACV. |
When calculating Incremental ACV against renewal opportunities, we consider the Renewal ACV (please see "How Renewal ACV is Calculated" for more details). In the following scenario, we will look at how IACV is calculated:
| Type | Opportunity Term | ACV | Renewal ACV | Incremental ACV | Explanation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New Business | 12 months | $120,000 | $0 | $120,000 | New customer signs for less than or equal to 12 months is IACV. |
| Add On Business | 5 months | $50,000 | $0 | $50,000 | Customer add on at less than or equal to 12 months is IACV. |
| Renewal | 12 months | $240,000 | $170,000 | $70,000 | The IACV from the new and add on business from the previous year total $170,000, while the ACV of the renewal opp is $240,000. The delta is IACV of $70,000. |
Note that in the above scenario, while you are only paid for the first 5 months for the upsell, you are paid for the remaining 7 months on the renewal, meaning you are paid the entire 12 month upsell ($120,000 IACV) over two separate opportunities.
Contractual Ramps: this happens when a customer wants to increase the number of users over time on a single contract.
Contract Resets/Restarts: this happens when a customer wants to restart their subscription in the middle of term.
| Type | Opportunity Term | Dates | ACV | Renewal ACV | Incremental ACV | Explanation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New Business | 12 months | Jan 1 - Dec 31 | $12,000 | $0 | $12,000 | New customer signs for 12 month plan at $12,000 IACV |
| New Business | 9 months | Apr 1 - Dec 31 | ($9,000) | $0 | ($9,000) | Credit opp: Customer wants to upgrade to $24,000, but also wants to reset their term starting Apr 1 |
| Renewal | 12 months | Apr 1 - Mar 30 | $24,000 | $3,000 | $21,000 | Contract reset is closed. Renewal ACV is only $3,000 ($12,000 - $9,000). |
Consolidation of Subscriptions: this happens when a customer wants to combine multiple subscriptions into one. In this case, we would total all current Renewal ACV into a single renewal opportunity.
| Type | Opportunity Term | Dates | ACV | Renewal ACV | Incremental ACV | Explanation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New Business (Sub 1) | 12 months | Jan 1 - Dec 31 | $12,000 | $0 | $12,000 | New customer signs for 12 month plan at $12,000 IACV |
| New Business (Sub 2) | 12 months | Jul 1 - Jun 30 | $12,000 | $0 | $12,000 | New customer signs for 12 month plan at $12,000 IACV |
| New Business (Sub 2) | 6 months | Jan 1 - Jun 30 | ($6,000) | $0 | ($6,000) | Credit opp: Customer will cancel this subscription for the remainder of term to coterminate their subscriptions |
| Renewal (Sub 1 + Sub 2) | 12 months | Jan 1 - Dec 31 | $24,000 | $18,000 | $6,000 | Renewal consoildation will take the full 12 months for Sub 1 and the remaining credit for Sub 2 ($12,000 - $6,000). |
Splitting Subscriptions: this happens when a customer wants to split a single subscription into multiple subscriptions. In this case, we would split the renewal ACV from the single renewal opp into multiple opportunities:
| Type | Opportunity Term | Dates | ACV | Renewal ACV | Incremental ACV | Explanation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New Business | 12 months | Jan 1 - Dec 31 | $12,000 | $0 | $12,000 | New customer signs for 12 month plan at $12,000 IACV |
| Renewal Business (Sub 1) | 12 months | Jan 1 - Dec 31 | $3,000 | $3,000 | $0 | Customer is taking 1/4 of users and creating new subscription. $3,000 is the renewal ACV from the original $12,000. |
| Renewal Business (Sub 2) | 6 months | Jan 1 - Jun Dec 31 | $9,000 | $9,000 | $0 | Customer is taking 3/4 of users and creating new subscription. $9,000 is the renewal ACV from the original $12,000. |
In the above scenario, the total Renewal ACV of two new renewal opps should total the IACV of the original opportunity.
Value of new bookings from new and existing customers that will result in recurring revenue over the next 12 months. Gross IACV includes true-ups, refunds and CI Minutes.
Value of new bookings from new and existing customers that will result in recurring revenue over the next 12 months LESS any credits, lost renewals, downgrades or any other decrease to annual recurring revenue
Value of bookings from existing customers that will result in recurring revenue over the next 12 months LESS any credits, lost renewals, downgrades or any other decrease to annual recurring revenue
Contract value from subscription orders sold into a specific Account that is not the first subscription order sold into that specific Account. Contract value that increases at the time of subscription renewal which can come from a combination of new seats + true-ups + upgrades/downgrades + change in discount
The collection of all Salesforce Accounts that roll up to the same Ultimate Parent Account.
Contract value from the first subscription order sold into a Account Family.
Contract value from the first new subscription order with an Account that is related to an existing customer Account Family (regardless of relative position in corporate hierarchy)
The change in annual recurring revenue (ARR) from one period to the next.
When looking at a time horizon of the next twelve months delta ARR will equal IACV except:
Delta ARR = iACV - [True Ups] + [Coterm difference] +/- [Timing differences]
Contract value that is not considered a subscription and the work is performed by the Professional Services team.
Value of all bookings from new and existing customers that will result in revenue less any credits, lost renewals, downgrades or any other decrease (i.e. within 90 days from close of the deal).
If Deal Length is greater than 12 months: Then TCV = ((ACV / 12) * Deal Term in Months) + Professional Services + Other One Time Fees
If Deal Length is less then or equal 12 months: Then TCV = ACV + Professional Services + Other One Time Fees
Annual revenue opportunity of the entirety of GitLab’s market. The potential value of everyone worldwide that could purchase our product.
A subset of TAM, the annual revenue opportuntiy of the entirety of GitLab's market within our current customer base. The potential value of all users that could purchase our product within existing customer base.
Lost or lowered contract value that occurs before a subscription renewal or subscription cancellation.
Given our land and expand model, we need to attribute our sales and marketing expense toward both our acquiring new customers and growing new customers. We refer to CAC as just the portion of our sales and marketing expense related to new customer acquisition. We allocate sales expense by using number of active customers because the number of active customers operationally drives where sales spends time. It also doesn't underweight sales time spent on first order which tends to be smaller than growth. We divide our customer base into cohorts by the quarter when they had their first active subscription. We then weight sales expense to each cohort by the number of active customers in that cohort. Our marketing expense is allocated between first order business and connected new business based on IACV because those are the key KPIs we use to evaluate marketing.
Therefore CAC = Allocated Sales & Marketing Expense/Number of First Order Acquired
where
Allocated Sales and Marketing Expense = Sales Expense * First Order Customers / Total Active Customers + Marketing Expense * First Order IACV / (First Order IACV + Connected New IACV)
Allocated Sales & Marketing Expense to new customer acquisition/ACV from new customers (excludes growth from existing). Industry guidance reports that median performance is 1.15 with anything less than 1.0 is considered very good. All bookings in period (including multiyear); bookings are equal to billings with standard payment terms.
Contract value that results in a lower value than the previous contract value. Downgrade examples include seat reductions, product downgrades, discounts, and customers switching to Reseller at time of renewal.
The number of contracted users on active paid subscriptions. Excludes OSS, Education, Core and other non-paid users. The data source is Zuora.
Customer Life-Time Value is the amount of gross margin contribution on a cash basis from a customer over the life of that customer.
The customer Life-Time Value to Customer Acquisition Cost ratio (LTV:CAC measures the relationship between the lifetime value of a customer and the cost of acquiring and growing that customer. A good LTV to CAC ratio is considered to be > 3.0..
To accurately calculate the LTV to CAC of a customer sum all the cash that a customer has paid GitLab over the life of the customer times the gross margin and divide it by the total sales and marketing cost to acquire and grow this customer. These cash flows are discounted back using the GitLab cost of capital or discount rate. We use 15% for our discount rate. This metric is the most accurate view of our unit economics however given we don't have many customers over 4 years of tenure with us there are assumptions in the numbers. This should be used for internal decision making only.
Defined as how long in months it takes to get a return on our sales and marketing dollars. We calculate this by taking the growth in gross margin contribution in the current twelve month period and dividing it by the amount of sales and marketing spend in the prior twelve month period. To report this in months we calculate 12/(revenue growth current twelve months x gross margin)/sales and marketing expense prior twelve months)). This metric is short-term in nature but has a broader horizon of return (12-24 months) compared to IACV efficiency. A benefit is that it is broadly comparable to public companies. Its limitations are: 1) it is a lagging metric, 2) it is tied to gaap revenue as opposed to ARR.
Defined as how much we spend in sales and marketing to generate revenue in a period. We calculate this by taking a ratio of the amount of sales and marketing spend in the prior period compared to the growth in revenue in the current period. The formula is (sales and marketing expense over trailing twelve months) / (recurring revenue current quarter * 4 - recurring revenue from same quarter prior year * 4). While the metric is easy to calculate its limitation is that the sales and marketing efforts don't have as much impact on revenue in the current period as they do on bookings or future period revenue.
We've seen both this definition of CAC Payback period which the output is months and the CAC to Revenue Payback Ratio in which the output is a ratio used by companies in their investor presentation. However, while similar they treat revenue slightly differently. CAC Payback period takes the trailing 12 month gross margin contribution while the CAC to Revenue Payback Ratio compares the quarterly recurring revenue in the current quarter vs the quarterly recurring revenue in the same quarter prior year.
Mathematically to convert them CAC to Revenue Payback Ratio = CAC Payback Period / 12 * gross margin * current period growth in revenue / (recurring revenue current quarter * 4 - recurring revenue same quarter prior period *4)
We have both because investors might be familiar with different ones. Our CEO and CFO have signed off on this duplication.
As we acquire new customers we analyze how long it takes to recoup the investment to acquire a new customer. This is calculated by taking one cohort of customers and plotting the sum of the cash paid to GitLab by new customers over time and then plotting the amount of sales and marketing expense allocated to that cohort. Where the two lines cross is where GitLab breaks even on the customer acquisition.
Contract value that is lost at the time of subscription renewals.
Lost Renewals examples include cancellations at or before the subscription renewal date.
If you have a customer who is not renewing, you must mark the Stage as 8-Closed Lost.
IACV for trailing three months / Sales and marketing Spend over trailing months -6 to months -4 (one quarter lag) (see the details of this spend, as defined in the IACV Efficiency Ratio). Industry guidance suggests a good Magic Number is > 1.0. GitLab's target is to be at 1.1.
Measurement of closed won, sales assisted opportunities vs the total number of created, sales assisted opportunities in a given period.
Net IACV that come from New Customers divided by the number of net new closed deals in the current month.
Net IACV that come from New Customers and sold by the field sales team and not fulfilled through the web portal divided by the number of net new closed deals in the current month.
ARR divided by number of Licensed Users.
This metric may also be referred to as Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) or Average Revenue Per Account (ARPA).
Ratio of total IACV from closed won, Web Direct opportunities (i.e. customers who purchase via the self-service portal) divided by the total IACV of all closed won opportunities. GitLab's target is greater than 30%. The default measurement is IACV but this can also be calculated and reported for ACV.
The IACV of all open opportunities currently in the stages of 4-Proposal, 5-Negotiating, and 6-Awaiting Signature.
The IACV of all open opportunities.
We measure pipeline generated on a monthly basis for net new customers and existing customers. For KPI measurement pipeline creation vs plan should exceed 1.0.
The value of previously closed Won ACV that is up for renewal. Renewal ACV should not include ACV from Professional Services or True-Ups. For clarity this does not include multi-year deals during the mult-year contract term.
Renewals ACV can be calculated in the following ways:
| Type | Opportunity Term | Amount/TCV | Incremental ACV | Explanation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New Business | 12 months | $120,000 | $120,000 | New customer signs for less than or equal to 12 months is IACV. |
| Add On Business | 5 months | $40,000 | $40,000 | Existing customer signs for less than or equal to 12 months is IACV. |
In the above case, the Renewals ACV will be $160,000. Any delta from this number will result in a positive or negative impact to IACV.
True Ups: Remember that true-ups are NOT included in the Renewals ACV of a renewing customer, even though they are classified as IACV. Let's look at the scenario below:
| Type | Opportunity Term | Amount/TCV | Incremental ACV | Explanation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New Business | 12 months | $48,000 | $48,000 | New customer purchases 1,000 Starter Seats |
| First Renewal | 12 months | $96,000 | $48,000 | Customer renews the 1,000 Seats, but also has a true up for 500 users. They also need to purchase 500 seats for the following term, so the IACV is $48,000 |
| Second Renewal | 12 months | $48,000 | $0 | On the second renewal, there is no growth from the 1,500 users, and since we are not including true ups in the Renewal ACV, the IACV is $0 (and not -$48,000 if we included true ups) |
Renewals ACV plus Growth IACV minus (Lost Renewals + Credits + Downgrades)
The value of the first twelve (12) months of any mid-term upgrade.
A unique deal that is set to Closed Won in SalesForce.
Utilization is defined as Seats currently in use / Seats in license.
When not qualified, referring to "utilization" always refers to license utilization.
All other uses, (e.g. CPU utilization), should be qualified and mentioned specifically.
Exclusive ACV categories in which each dollar counts once.
See our customer success page in the handbook for more details.
During the sales cycle potential customers that have questions that are not within the scope of sales can have their queries escalated in different ways depending on the account size:
Once a prospect becomes a customer, depending on the product purchased, they will be assigned a Support Level (Account) in Salesforce:
If a customer does not renew their plan, their account will be transitioned to an "Expired" status.
If a client has a question or suggestion about a particular part of the product, find out with whom on the Product team you need to speak by looking under DevOps Stages on the Product stages, groups, and categories page.
Being in a customer facing role, salespeople are expected to contribute to GitLab Direction. Each day we talk to customers and prospects we have the opportunity to hear of a feature they find valuable or to give feedback (positive and constructive) to an feature that there is an issue for. When you hear of feedback or you personally have feedback, we encourage you to comment within the issue, if one exists, or create your own issue on our Issue Tracker. Checking the GitLab Direction page and the Issue Tracker should happen throughout the week.
When you have an organization that is interested in a feature and you have commented in the issue and added a link to the account in salesforce, please follow the process outlined on the product handbook to arrange a call with the product manager and account to further discuss need of feature request.
We have great investors who can and want to help us penetrate strategic accounts. Please discuss with your Manager details of your request and fill out this form. Your request will be reviewed for completness and faciliated directly to the Investor or included in the monthly investor update section called "Asks". All requests should be made before the 1st of the month so they are included in the upcoming investor update.
If an investor can help, they will contact the CRO, and the CRO will introduce the salesperson and the investor. The salesperson shall ask how the investor wants to be updated on progress and follow up accordingly.
This introduction email is progressive. You can choose to use just the first paragraph or the first two, three, or four depending on the detail you feel is appropriate for your audience.
GitLab is a complete DevOps platform, delivered as a single application, fundamentally changing the way Development, Security, and Ops teams collaborate. GitLab helps teams accelerate software delivery from weeks to minutes, reduce development costs, and reduce the risk of application vulnerabilities while increasing developer productivity. GitLab provides unmatched visibility, radical new levels of efficiency and comprehensive governance to significantly compress the time between planning a change and monitoring its effect.
GitLab collapses cycle times by driving higher efficiency across all stages of the software development lifecycle. For the first time, Product, Development, QA, Security, and Operations teams can collaborate in a single application. There’s no need to integrate and synchronize tools, or waste time waiting for handoffs. Everyone contributes to a single conversation, instead of managing multiple threads across disparate tools. Development teams have complete visibility across the lifecycle with a single, trusted source of data to simplify troubleshooting and drive accountability. All activity is governed by consistent controls, making security and compliance first-class citizens instead of an afterthought.
Built on Open Source, GitLab leverages the community contributions of thousands of developers and millions of users to continuously deliver new DevOps innovations. More than 100,000 organizations from startups to global enterprise organizations, including Ticketmaster, Jaguar Land Rover, NASDAQ, Dish Network and Comcast trust GitLab to deliver great software at new speeds.
Some additional detail is linked below:
MEDDPPICC (view the MEDDPPICC training slides) is a proven sales methodology used for strategic opportunity management and complex sales process orchestration for enterprise organizations. These questions should be answered in the "1-Discovery" and "2-Scoping" stages of the sales process and appear in the MEDDPPICC section of the Command Plan in Salesforce (part of the opportunity layout) and will be required for all new business opportunities that are greater than the Opportunity Management Requirements.
Every GitLab customer is unique. For this we believe we must spend time understanding which of their Problems can GitLab solve in order to show them how and if we can help.
It starts by understanding the bigger picture your customer is working towards, this means taking a step back from the technical requirements, to understand why those are important to the business.
A Value Deck is dedicated to your focus accounts on which you will be spending more time. It is a deck that contains high level information on the Corporate Objectives, Business Strategies, Key initiatives and Challenges.
We then use this information to formulate a Problem Statement that sums up your customer’s Challenges and what could happen if the Business Strategies and thus Corporate Objectives are not met.
Spending time on this will help you understand your customers better to work smart together, it will also help you formulate the business value at the Commercial Validation stage.
You can introduce the Value Deck at any stage but it is always best to do it before you start prospecting as it can help you build customised emails to your different accounts.
Make it collaborative: work on it with your customer (or print a blank version and offer them to fill it), and have them review your findings to see if there is anything to add. Your champions will appreciate that, and can share more details about their Challenges and Key Initiatives than Uncle Google.
The GitLab product is incredibly well matched to customer needs. In fact, we almost always earn a customer and grow quickly if they simply 1) give it a real try and 2) understand it. That means our best sales motion is to ensure we accomplish both at the same time. We've learned that a hands-on workshop is the best way to help the customer understand and make good decisions from the first conversation to the first expansion decision to the move to a higher tier and to the renewals down the road. At every step, a workshop is the most efficient and effective way to serve the customer.
Goal for every conversation with a customer:
Sales Motion and Sequence:
In Stage 3-Technical Evaluation, a prospect or customer may engage in a proof of concept as part of the evaluation. If they decide to engage, please fill in the following information, as we will use this to track existing opportunities currently engaged in a POV, as well as win rates for customers who have engaged in a POV vs. those that do not.
Once you have reached Stage 4-Proposal, you should agree to a purchasing plan with your prospect/contact. This will include a clear understanding of purchase/contract review process and a close plan. This should include actions to be taken, named of people to complete actions and dates for each action. The information captured in this field will be used by sales management to see if the deal is progressing as planned. Delays in the purchasing plan may result in a request to push the opportunity into the following period.
Sales Segmentation information can be found in the Business Operations - Database Management section.
GitLab's Export Control Classification (or ECCN) is 5D992.c. As a consequence of this classification, we currently do not do business in: Iran, Sudan, Syria, North Korea, Cuba and the Crimean region of the Ukraine.
Using GitLab Version Check, GitLab usage data is pushed into Salesforce for both CE, EE and EE trial users. Once in Salesforce application, you will see a tab called "Usage Statistics". Using the drop down view, you can select CE, EE trails or EE to see all usage data sent to Gitlab. Since version check is pulling the host name, the lead will be recorded as the host name. Once you have identified the correct company name, please update the company name. Example: change gitlab.boeing.com to Boeing as the company name.
To view the usage, click the hyperlink under the column called "Usage Statistics". The link will consist of several numbers and letters like, a3p61012001a002. You can also access usage statistics on the account object level within Salesforce. Within the account object, there is a section called "Usage Ping Data", which will contain the same hyperlink as well as a summary of version they are using, active users, historical users, license user count, license utilization % and date data was sent to us.
A few example of how to use Usage Statistics to pull insight and drive action?
Take a look at a Training Video to explain in greater detail by searching for the "Sales Training" folder on the Google Drive.
In an effort to make the Usage/Version ping data simpler to use in SFDC, there are 2 fields directly on the account layout - "CE Instances" and "Active CE Users" under the "GitLab/Tech Stack Information" section on the Salesforce account record.
The source of these fields is to use the latest version ping record for and usage record for each host seen in the last 60 days and combine them into a single record. The hosts are separated into domain-based hosts and IP-based hosts. For IP based hosts, we run the IP through a reverse-DNS lookup to attempt to translate to a domain-based host. If no reverse-DNS lookup (PTR record) is found, we run the IP through a whois lookup and try to extract a company name, for instance, if the IP is part of a company's delegated IP space. We discard all hosts that we are unable to identify because they have a reserved IP address (internal IP space) or are hosted in a cloud platform like GCP, Alibaba Cloud, or AWS as there is no way to identify those organizations through this data. For domain-based hosts, we use the Datafox &/or DiscoverOrg domain lookup API to identify the company and firmographic data associated with the organization and finally the Google Geocoding API to parse, clean, and standardize the address data as much as possible.
These stats will be aggregated up and only appear on the Ultimate Parent account in SFDC when there are children (since we don't really know which host goes to which child).
To see a list of accounts by # of CE users or instances, you can use the CE Users list view in SFDC. To filter for just your accounts, hit the "edit" button and Filter for "My Accounts". Make sure to save it under a different name so you don't wipe out the original. These fields are also available in SFDC reporting.
A few caveats about this data:
For the process of working these accounts, appending contacts from third-party tools, and reaching out, please refer to the business operations section of the handbook.
For information regarding the tech stack at GitLab, please visit the Tech Stack Applications page of the Business Operations handbook where we maintain a comprehensive table of the tools used across the company, in addition to a 'cheat-sheet' for quick reference of who should have access and whom to contact with questions.
Please use the handbook as much as possible instead of traditional office applications. When you have to use office applications always use Gsuite applications instead of Microsoft Office; for example, Google Sheets instead of Excel, Google Docs instead of Word, and Google Slides instead of Keynote or Powerpoint. Give the entire company editing rights whenever possible so everyone can contribute.
Before a LEAD is converted or an OPPORTUNITY is created the following must occur:
Opportunities can only be created from a CONTACT record or when converting a LEAD. See the 'How to create an Opportunity' section of the Business OPS handbook.
What is it?
A true up is a back payment for a customer going over their license count during the year.
Why do we use it?
We use the true up model so that the license never becomes a barrier to adoption for the client.
Let's take an example.
A customer takes out a subscription for 100 users. During the year they grow the usage of the server and 200 additional users come on board. When it comes time to renew, they are now up to 300 active users despite the license only being for 100 users.
At this point the customer needs to do two things: they need to renew the license and to add the true up users.
The number of true up users in this case is 200.
It is the difference between the Maximum Users and the Users in License.
This can be found by the customer in their GitLab server by going to the Admin > License area.
It will look like this
There is more information below on the steps you need to take, but in this example you would need to update the number of users for the renewal to 300 and add the True Up product to the renewal quote for 200 users.
This will create a one time only charge to the customer and in a year's time, they will have a renewal for 300 users.
See here more information on the steps to take for the true up
Note that we make provision for true ups in our standard Subscription Terms Section 5 - Payment of Fees.
Deal Size is a dimension by which we will measure stage to stage conversions and stage cycle times of opportunities. Values are IACV in USD.
Note that we use the same amounts to group customers by ARR.
Associating emails to Salesforce is a best practice that should be followed by all users. Attaching emails to a Lead, Account, Contact, or Opportunity record are vital for transparency, as any number of team members can review the correspondence between GitLab and the customer/prospect account. It doesn't do anyone any good when all of the correspondence is kept in a user's inbox.
With that said, there are multiple ways that an email can be associated to an opportunity. But before you do that, you must first make sure that the contact record is associated to an opportunity via the Contact Roles object.
To add a Contact Role to an opportunity:
Email to Salesforce allows you to associate emails to Opportunities using an email long email string that associates the email to the contact. To set this up:
If you want to associate emails to Opportunities using Outreach, follow these steps:
If you want to associate emails to Opportunities or other records using the Salesforce Lightning for Gmail plug in, follow these steps:
Add to ChromeAdd ExtensionIf you have any issues with the setup, please contact the Director of Sales Operations via Slack, email, or SFDC Chatter.
See the order processing page for information and training related to using Salesforce to create accounts, contacts, opportunities, etc.; opportunity reassignments; returning customer creation; and more.
Please see our value proposition.
GitLab is an organisation that is built on contribution and collaboration. These values are not only critical for building a great product, they are critical for building a world class commercial team. Each member of the sales team is expected to create insider notes in Salesforce on accounts and conversations they are involved with. With GitLab being a remote company, it weighs even more importance on creating and maintaining a culture of great note taking.
Read: How we take notes at GitLab
SMB Customer Advocates may use this deck as a guide for sales meetings. Speaking tips and best practices are included in the Comments section of each slide.
Please see Club Page to find out more about our President's Club Program.
The goal of this process is to capture information about the technology an account in SalesForce uses in each stage of their DevOps Tools landscape (based on competitors as of 2020-04-10 https://about.gitlab.com/devops-tools/). This will allow us to market & sell to specific stages in their CI/CD process more accurately.
Please enter the following data in the "Stage Technoogy secion of the Account object in SFDC
st_(Stage) Tech: Current technology used by prospect/customer (Including GitLab)st_(Stage) Appetite for Replacement: Red (Don't want to change), Yellow (Might change) /Green (Willing to change)st_(Stage) Contract End Date: As exact as possible date their current technology contract endThis is to support FY21Q1 OKR: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/sales-team/field-operations/sales-operations/issues/684
To standardize our messaging around Coronavirus and the impact it is having on our prospects and customers, please reference the below processes:
#covid in the SFDC Opportunity field [CP] Close Plan to indicate you have had this conversation with your prospect/customer and use this report to confirm your Opportunity is tagged correctly: COVID Mentions in CP Close Planc19 to any activity record where a discussion was held.
