Hacker News Reader

Comment by mnutt | Hacker News Reader

This is a really good overview of some features that are common in enterprise SaaS, but I would caution against thinking that they're necessary to be successful in enterprise SaaS.* My experience has been that if you have a really compelling core feature set, most everything else is negotiable. Some are nice to have, some are regulatory, and some are just something someone added to a list because they thought it sounded like a good idea. Even the ones you do decide to implement, make sure you do enough customer discovery to figure out how it relates to your market.

* Except security. Always be thinking about security.

View on HN

I appreciate your level response. You're correct that these features are not absolutely, always necessary for success. I would caution that even with a an incredibly compelling core feature set, you still have to negotiate yourself out of not providing these features. Even when you win you might be creating a maintenance nightmare for someone down the totem pole within your customer's org. Part of what we're trying to do with EnterpriseReady is show that many of the non-core (yet common among many enterprise customers) features 1) aren't that hard to understand 2) can be built really well in a way that will delight your users.

* As the OP, when you say: "some are just something someone added to a list because they thought it sounded like a good idea" - I genuinely hope that I did not do that.

100% - Always be thinking about security.

>* As the OP, when you say: "some are just something someone added to a list because they thought it sounded like a good idea" - I genuinely hope that I did not do that.

In my reading he was referring to negotiations that SaaS product companies have with customers; saying that sometimes customers will request features that "sound like a good idea" but aren't necessary or fully thought out.

I could have worded that better, I was referring to someone within the client organization adding on requirements arbitrarily.

Ha, makes sense... I didn't really take any offense.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com