The 30 Best Resources for High Growth Companies

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The sheer amount of information available to SaaS marketers, product managers, and founders today is overwhelming – and sifting through it is a full time job. Here’s shortlist of the best blogs, newsletters, tools and articles for SaaS companies.

Vendor’s Blogs

There’s a new school of B2B vendors out there with a genuine commitment to producing quality content. As subject market experts, I’ll go out on a limb and say they’re offering better information than most media outlets.

Buffer. Your one stop shop for all things social media.

Wistia. Spend some time with Wistia’s content, and you’ll be shooting and editing videos like a pro before you know it. If you need proof, here’s a real life case study.

Litmus. Whether you’re a marketer, agency owner or designer – Litmus will give you practical tips on how to be an email all-star.

Helpscout. Helpscout offers great content on customer support, as you’d expect from a company that makes customer support software. But they’re also one of the best resources for founders and managers who care about building a strong company culture.

Intercom. Plenty of great information for product managers, and for anyone who cares deeply about building a great customer experience.

VC Blogs

These VCs offer insanely helpful perspectives for founders, entrepreneurs, and anyone working in a startup environment.

Fred Wilson, of Union Square Ventures, pens one of the most popular blogs for entrepreneurs. Don’t skip the comments – they’re often as thought-provoking as the content itself.

Ben Horowitz of Andreessen Horowitz offers his perspective on important lessons for startups. As an added bonus, each post starts with a quote from a hip hop artist.

Tomasz Tunguz of Redpoint offers great stats and resources for SaaS companies.

Charlie O’Donnell of Brooklyn Bridge Ventures does a great job of articulating the perspective of a VC – helpful context for any founder.

Paul Graham, co-founder of Y Combinator, shares thought provoking views on a broader range of topics than most of his fellow VC bloggers. Recent topics include social and economic fragmentation; how to write like a human being, and a tribute to his co-founder and wife Jessica Livingston that is perhaps one of the most heartfelt (and revealing) essays I’ve come across. You will be a better person for reading what Paul Graham has to say.

Newsletters

There aren’t many e-newsletters I take the time to read regularly. These all make the cut, because they offer useful information in a concise format.

Sidebar. The 5 best design links, curated daily. Even if you’re not a designer, this will give you a great glimpse into what’s happening – and what’s possible – in the world of web design.

Mattermark. A compilation of interesting articles from entrepreneurs and investors.

Moz Top 10. Hands down the best newsletter (and blog) to stay on top of all things SEO.

Term Sheet. Fortune’s Dan Primack summarizes the major, exits, investments, and IPOs you should know about.

Product Hunt. You might get the occasional email about hipster desk accessories or apps for cat lovers. But for the most part, Product Hunt will give you a community curated and upvoted list of apps, tools, and resources on startups, productivity, marketing and more.

Articles & Tools

The articles and free tools that I’ve found particularly helpful – and inspiring.

Kathy Sierra on Badass Users. Clear your calendar for 45 minutes and take the time to watch this talk. You can thank me after.

David Skok’s explanation of SaaS metrics. The most helpful resources for explaining the metrics that matter to SaaS companies.

ProfitWell. An automated free SaaS dashboard, from the team at Price Intelligently.

SVPG’s post on Consensus vs. Collaboration. Every single growth company is going to hit the stage where yesterday’s collaboration is today’s consensus-building. This article does a great job of articulating the difference.

The Netflix Culture deck. An oldie but goodie. Sheryl Sandberg once referred to the Netflix culture deck as possibly “the most important document ever” to come out of Silicon Valley. Even if you’ve read it before, it’s worth revisiting.

Bonus Round

A hodgepodge of more blogs, articles, and tools that make life in a startup just a little bit easier.

Price Intelligently. Excellent content and examples for all your SaaS pricing questions.

Marketing Charts. Lots of numbers for pretty much any marketing topic under the sun. Occasionally useful when trying to make points like, “I think we should invest in marketing automation” to non-marketers.

Canva. A free tool for producing banners, social media images, presentation images and more. Danger: You may end up spending more time with it than you originally intend – it’s that much fun.

Copyblogger. Advice on effective writing and content marketing.

Quantcast. Get traffic stats on your competitors. Not available for as many sites as Alexa, but when the site you’re looking for is available, Quantcast typically offers richer insight.

Marty Cagan’s Inspired. An easy to read book to help you understand how to create products that customers love.

Eric Ries’ The Lean Startup. One of the best business books out there – required reading for anyone working in a startup.

Ben Horowitz’s The Hard Thing about Hard Things . A compilation of posts from Ben’s blog. A quick and insightful read.

Moat. A tool to look up competitors’ ad creative and placements.

And of course, there’s also Databox. Hey, gratuitous self-promotion never goes out of style – if you like this article, be sure to check out some of our other posts and resources.