How to sell to Heads of Sales at SaaS companies
Heads of Sales in SaaS companies are primarily measured on quarterly revenue growth. They respond to outreach that demonstrates an understanding of their sales pipeline challenges, particularly how to optimize lead conversion rates. Highlighting specific strategies that can reduce churn or increase upsell opportunities will capture their attention.
Written and maintained by the SoloRiff team, who build outbound software and run outbound with it. The figures below are our own: we measured 559 saas company domains over public DNS on 2026-09-03. Last updated 2026-09-03.
What actually hurts
- low lead conversion rates
- high churn rates
- inefficient sales processes
- team misalignment
The playbook
- 01
Identify teams with declining conversion rates
Use tools like LinkedIn Sales Navigator to filter for SaaS companies that have reported a drop in lead-to-customer conversion rates in the last quarter. This indicates a potential pain point where your solution could help improve their sales effectiveness.
- 02
Research recent funding rounds
Look for SaaS companies that have recently secured funding. These companies are likely to be investing in sales growth and may be more open to solutions that can enhance their sales processes or technology stack.
- 03
Highlight impact on sales efficiency
Craft your outreach to emphasize how your solution can directly improve sales efficiency, particularly in managing remote sales teams. Use industry-specific language that resonates with their current challenges and operational needs.
- 04
Address common objections about integration
Anticipate objections regarding integration with existing systems. Prepare to explain how your solution can seamlessly integrate with popular CRM platforms used in SaaS, and provide examples of successful implementations.
- 05
Follow up post-product launch announcements
Schedule your follow-ups around product launch announcements from your target companies. These events often lead to increased demand for sales solutions, making your outreach more timely and relevant.
Can saas companies even receive your mail?
We measured the DNS of 559 saas companies, sampled evenly across company sizes, to see how many authenticate their own email. It matters in both directions: a domain that does not authenticate is a domain whose team is used to mail going missing — and if your own domain is in the gap, yours is the mail going missing.
Publishes a DMARC policy of quarantine or reject — the domain actually asks receivers to act on failures.
The gap is the finding: 16.7% of 1–10-person companies against 80.9% of the largest — 64 points apart. Small companies are where the unauthenticated domains are, and small companies are who most cold outreach is aimed at.
Where does your domain sit?
Same three lookups, run live against your domain. Nothing is stored and nothing is emailed to you.
How this was measured
Company domains were sampled within employee-count bands, then queried over public DNS for SPF (TXT at the apex), DMARC (TXT at _dmarc.) and MX. One domain per company, deduplicated. Anyone can reproduce any single row of this with dig.
DKIM is deliberately absent. A DKIM key lives under a selector that cannot be enumerated from outside the domain, so a company with flawless DKIM under a name we did not guess would be counted as having none. That would measure our guess list, not the industry.
Domains with no MX record are excluded rather than counted as failures — parked and redirect-only domains would otherwise drag every figure down and make the result an artefact of the sample.
Sampled within bands, so this describes the population of companies, not of employees: a 10-person company counts once, as does a 10,000-person one. Each band is at least 60 domains; bands below that are not published. Figures are percentages of the sample, not of the whole industry, and we publish no company names — only counts.
Measured 2026-09-03. Re-measured monthly.
The full census across every industry — sortable, with sample sizes, free to reuse under CC BY 4.0.
Subject lines that fit
- Boost your sales conversion
- Strategies to reduce churn
- Optimize your sales pipeline
Questions
- Why do Heads of Sales ignore outreach about sales tools?
- Heads of Sales often receive numerous outreach messages and may ignore them if they do not immediately see a clear benefit or relevance to their specific challenges. If the outreach lacks a strong connection to their current goals or pain points, it is likely to be overlooked.
- What metrics do Heads of Sales prioritize?
- Heads of Sales typically prioritize metrics like quarterly revenue growth, lead conversion rates, and customer retention. They focus on metrics that directly impact their ability to meet sales targets and drive business growth, making these critical areas for any outreach.
- How can I get a response from a Head of Sales?
- To get a response, tailor your message to address specific challenges they face, such as optimizing their sales processes or improving team performance. Demonstrating a clear understanding of their unique situation and offering actionable insights can increase your chances of engagement.
- What common challenges do Heads of Sales face?
- Common challenges include managing remote sales teams, aligning sales strategies with business goals, and reducing customer churn. They also struggle with ensuring their sales processes are efficient and effective in a competitive SaaS landscape.
Or have it run itself
SoloRiff does every step above on its own — finds the companies, finds the people, writes each of them individually, and handles the replies. Drop your URL and watch it work before you sign up for anything.
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