Top B2B SaaS Influencers to Follow in 2024
Last updated: July 22nd, 2024
Learning from those with a proven track record of success in the SaaS world can inspire you to refine your marketing tactics and help you keep up with the industry trends. To follow the best of the best, we’ve curated a list of the top B2B SaaS influencers of today.
Many of these influential SaaS experts have founded what are now considered to be major software solutions, some of which you’re probably familiar with. In most cases, their road to success has been an interesting one but they’ve persevered and come out the other end with a lot of wisdom to share.
Let’s find out who’s who in the world of B2B SaaS.
Jason Lemkin

Key achievements: The founder and brainchild of the SaaStr community.
Jason Lemkin is the name behind SaaStr, the renowned SaaS community and networking event. In 2005, he founded the e-signature platform EchoSign, which was subsequently acquired by Adobe. Along with SaaStr, he’s now the managing director at Storm Ventures, a venture capital firm aimed squarely at B2B start-ups.
He’s passionate about all things startups and new technology, having side-stepped into the world of biomedical technology with the design of implantable nanobatteries. Jason constantly promotes ethical leadership and management practices that build customer trust. You can read some of his pearls of wisdom on his Medium and SaaStr blogs.
Follow Jason on LinkedIn, X, and Instagram.
Noah Kagan

Key achievements: Rebounded from failure to become the founder of a multi-million dollar SaaS business.
Noah Kagan is the quirky tech and marketing genius behind AppSumo, a platform where entrepreneurs and startups can get cut-price software to get their businesses rolling fast. He’s also just as well known as the brains behind Facebook Ads.
However, his career wasn’t always the beacon of hope, as he was rejected by Google twice, eventually fired by Facebook, and has been unsuccessful with over 10 startup ideas. He now boasts $80 million a year in revenue, has recently published a book on how to start a business, and maintains an active blog about everything marketing-related.
You can follow him on various social platforms like X, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube.
Nathan Latka

Key achievements: Founded a SaaS product that hit $1 million in revenue in its first year, all from his college dorm room.
Nathan Latka’s journey in the SaaS industry began during his college years when he founded a pioneering product designed to help SaaS companies capture email leads. He didn’t stop there, as he went on to establish Founderpath, a simple tool that helps SaaS startups acquire funding to get off the ground. This entrepreneurial spirit is what built his reputation on the SaaS scene.
Founderpath has since acquired SaaSOpen, another popular SaaS community for networking and connecting founders. In addition, he’s a published author of “How to Be a Capitalist Without Any Capital”, has an active YouTube channel where he interviews other SaaS founders, and hosts The Top Entrepreneurs podcast. Because of his passion for helping others find their way to success, he’s very active online.
You can follow Nathan on LinkedIn, Instagram, X, and Facebook.
Rand Fishkin

Key achievements: Building Moz revenues from $800k to $29.3m.
Rand Fishkin is most well-known as the co-founder of Moz, the marketing software you probably already know. After 7 years as CEO of Moz, where he grew the company exponentially, he took a step back in 2014 but remains chairman of Moz’s board. He has since cofounded several other successful software companies, like SparkToro and Snackbar Studio.
In addition to his many business ventures, Rand has co-authored several books on marketing and SEO, like “Lost and Founder”, his guide to the world of startups. A fun fact is that to book him for speaking events, you must first donate to GiveDirectly, a charity that helps impoverished people worldwide.
You can follow Rand on X, LinkedIn, Threads, Instagram, and Facebook.
Dharmesh Shah

Key achievements: Co-founder of HubSpot.
Dharmesh Shah is the co-founder and CTO of HubSpot, an undeniable giant in the world of digital marketing, having made $590 million in revenue last year. HubSpot is actually Dharmesh’s third company; Pyramid Digital Systems was his first startup, which he kicked off for just $10,000 and ended up selling for millions.
Dharmesh’s other great idea was OnStartups, a blog where he shares advice and insights for other entrepreneurs. He has since promised his wife not to start another company and now acts as an angel investor for other startups.
You can follow Dharmesh on LinkedIn, X, Facebook, and YouTube.
Dan Martell

Key achievements: Has an eye for spotting high-potential SaaS investments; he has founded 5 successful SaaS businesses.
Dan Martell is a serial entrepreneur and founder, having started several SaaS companies, including Clarity.fm and Spheric. He’s now turned his sights on investing in and coaching other startup founders.
He started SaaS Academy, which offers courses marketed directly at B2B SaaS founders eager to scale their businesses fast, and established High Speed Ventures, a SaaS acquisition company that purchases and scales high-potential businesses.
If that wasn’t impressive enough, Dan is also a triathlete and book author. You can get tidbits of free advice and inspiration by following him online.
The best platforms to follow Dan are X, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook.
April Dunford

Key achievements: World-leading SaaS product positioning expert.
April Dunford is the foremost product positioning expert for SaaS companies. She’s also an entrepreneur, investor, consultant, author, and keynote speaker. April has built her career with startups and has a deep understanding of what makes a winning product.
She has published two books: “Obviously Awesome”, which covers her tried and tested positioning methodology, and “Sales Pitch”, where you’ll learn how to craft a killer sales pitch for any product. You can also listen to her podcast to learn more about her strategies and the processes she uses in the competitive landscape of B2B SaaS.
Follow April on LinkedIn, X, and Instagram.
Aaron Levie

Key achievements: Started Box as a college sophomore that now brings in over $260 million a quarter.
Aaron Levie is the CEO and founder of the enterprise cloud storage solution Box. Aaron was a sophomore at college when the bright idea for Box popped up. He ended up dropping out to pursue it further, and the rest is history.
He managed to guide the company through its early years as well as the 2008 recession. He’s remained loyal to Box for 18 years and has come out the other end with a lot of wisdom to share.
For more of Aaron Levie’s insights into SaaS and startups, you can follow him on X, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
Natasha Vernier

Key achievements: Co-founder and CEO of Cable, a female-led financial compliance platform.
Natasha Vernier is the CEO and co-founder of Cable, a fintech platform that helps companies comply with financial crime requirements. Prior to starting Cable, she was one of the earliest employees at Monzo and ended her time there as Head of Financial Crime. It was while working at Monzo that she was blown away by the extent of financial crime globally and sought to find a better solution.
Cable is still new and growing, but Natasha’s passion for their goals has drawn attention and plenty of funding. On the same note, her down-to-earth approach to business and leadership has highlighted her as a leader to watch.
She posts occasionally on Medium, but you can also follow her on LinkedIn and X.
Asia Orangio

Key achievements: Guides early-stage startups to growth and success.
Asia Orangio is a stellar SaaS marketing consultant who has advised both big and small SaaS companies all over the world. She founded DemandMaven in 2018, a proudly woman-owned and led growth consultancy.
She is also one of our recommended marketing agency consultants because of her consistent track record of success, which is a result of her thorough and well-planned approach to strategy development.
Asia has sat on the board of Moz and held several high-profile roles like head of marketing and demand generation manager at two high-growth startups. Like many others who’ve taken the plunge to go solo and start their own venture, Asia had to ignore pessimistic feedback and run with it.
You can read more about Asia Orangio on her blog, listen to her podcast “In Demand”, or follow her on YouTube, LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and Facebook.
Sujan Patel

Key achievements: Founding Mailshake, which has achieved a two-fold year-over-year growth rate.
Sujan Patel is a growth marketer, entrepreneur, and self-confessed adrenaline junkie with over 15 years experience in SaaS.
His expertise comes from building 8 successful SaaS companies from the ground up and helping hundreds of others develop growth strategies that result in a huge revenue boost. Some of the companies he’s founded include Mailshake, Rightinbox, Zoomshift, and Linktexting.
His businesses have not always been a roaring success, and as such, he’s made it his mission to share his learnings with others. He is an accomplished author, and his book 100 Days of Growth provides proven strategies and advice for startup growth.
Sujan blogs regularly on his website, and you can also follow him on X, LinkedIn, and Instagram, and subscribe to his YouTube channel.
Christian Owens

Key achievements: High school dropout turned Tech founder at age 18.
Christian Owens is a bit of a wonder kid, having dropped out of high school at age 16 to pursue his startup idea that was Paddle. Paddle solved a problem and made it easier for companies to sell software online, scaling to over $2M in revenue in the first 18 months. The startup then grew into the billion-dollar platform that we see today.
Christian learned a lot from scaling Paddle and is passionate about encouraging self-taught individuals rather than following traditional educational paths. He has now stepped down from the position of CEO at Paddle but is a regular speaker at SaaS conferences and is active on social media. Follow him on Instagram, X, and LinkedIn.
TK Kader

Key achievements: A best-selling author and entrepreneur who now focuses on helping others unlock success in their lives.
TK Kader is a tech author, entrepreneur, and angel investor who founded his first company before officially graduating college. A few years later, he started ToutApp from the spare bedroom of his apartment and grew it into a multi-million dollar business before being acquired by Marketo.
Both his professional and personal life have had their ups and downs, which led him to start Unstoppable. Unstoppable provides a range of mentor programs for business founders to get more from their lives and businesses. His best-selling book “How to Punch the Sunday Jitters in the Face” is also a great read for anyone looking for additional motivation.
Kader is very active online, blogging regularly and maintaining a popular YouTube channel. You can also follow him on Instagram, LinkedIn, and X.
Steli Efti

Key achievements: Silicon Valley’s most prominent SaaS sales guru.
Steli Eftinopoulous, or as he’s more commonly known, Steli Efti, is an entrepreneur, SaaS sales expert, and cofounder of Close.io and Elastic. Steli rebounded from numerous startup failures before launching Close in 2013 and has since gone on to advise other SaaS businesses on winning sales tactics.
As an author of no less than 13 books, Steli is also a regular contributing author to the Close CRM blog and Forbes where he writes about all things SaaS business and sales techniques. As a notoriously engaging speaker, he cohosts The Startup Chat with Hiten Shah and frequently presents at SaaS conferences and events. Steli is very active on X, and you can also follow him on LinkedIn.
Stewart Butterfield

Key achievements: Founding and scaling Slack to over 2 million users and selling it for over $27 billion.
Stewart Butterfield is a Canadian businessman known for founding platforms like Flickr and Slack. Like many of these influential SaaS founders, Stewart taught himself to code as a child and has always been interested in technology.
In 2002, he co-founded Ludicorp, a failed gaming platform, but this evolved into Flickr, which ended up being acquired by Yahoo in 2005 for $20 million. Following several other gaming ventures, came Slack. Within a few years, Slack grew to over 2 million users and was named Inc Magazine’s Company of the Year in 2015.
Over the years, Stewart has received numerous awards and honors, such as Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in 2006 and the Wall Street Journal’s Technology Innovator for 2015. He’s now stepped away from Slack, having sold it to Salesforce for over $27 billion.
You can follow Stewart Butterfield on X, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
Danielle Morrill

Key achievements: Founder of multiple startups and investor of over 30 startups, having raised over $25 million in venture capital.
In comparison to many of our other SaaS influencers, Danielle Morrill was somewhat of a late bloomer, but her journey to be one of the best is nothing short of inspirational. Starting out with an interest in building websites and blogging about startups, she eventually made the right connections that propelled her ideas forward.
She is now a founder of multiple startups and the innovative thinker behind Mattermark, a marketing platform, and Groupthink, a collaborative AI assistant. She considers herself semi-retired but continues to utilize her expertise and knowledge to help other startup founders as a professional coach and angel investor.
Danielle still blogs regularly on her personal blog and her Substack, but you can also follow her on X, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
Marc Benioff

Key achievements: Starting Salesforce in the late 90’s and growing it to what it is today.
As the co-founder and CEO of Salesforce, Marc Benioff is a pretty major name in the industry.
Marc founded Salesforce back in 1999, as a rival to CD-ROM-based CRM software. Salesforce is now a global giant and the largest employer in San Francisco, and Marc serves on the World Economic Forum’s board of trustees. In 2016, he was listed as one of the “World’s 50 Greatest Leaders” by Fortune, and in 2019, he was acknowledged as one of the “10 Best-Performing CEOs” by Harvard Business Review.
Not only is he crushing it in the business world, but he’s also heavily involved in social activism and other philanthropic ventures. Over the years, Benioff has donated millions to various charities, including those in healthcare, environmental restoration, and combating homelessness.
It’s no surprise that Marc is very vocal on matters of business and is interviewed regularly, however, he doesn’t blog often and isn’t active on many social platforms. The best places to follow him are X or LinkedIn.
Benjamin Joffe

Key achievements: A global thought leader on the topic of climate tech and deep tech innovation.
Benjamin Joffe is a senior partner at SOSV, a venture firm specializing in climate tech. SOSV has over 1,000 portfolio companies under its wing and more than $1.3 billion in assets under management. They also had 6 companies listed in TIME Magazine’s “Best Inventions of 2021,” so it seems they have an eye for great things.
Benjamin joined the company with over 18 years of experience in the Asian tech industry, so he brings a fresh perspective to climate tech in the US. Although he is not a startup founder himself, he’s guided at least 500 startups and continues to handpick outstanding innovators.
Part of his role at SOSV is curating and producing the annual SOSV Climate Tech Summit. He also hosts a podcast related to the event and writes about interesting new startups and climate tech innovations on his Substack. You can also follow him on X and LinkedIn.
Shiv Narayanan

Key achievements: CEO of the leading marketing consultancy How To SaaS.
Shiv is the brains behind How To SaaS, a marketing strategy consultancy firm that works with private equity firms to boost the value of their portfolio companies. He is also an accomplished author and the host of PE Value Creation, a podcast for those in the private equity industry.
Shiv is a regular speaker at major conferences and events and is passionate about helping B2B companies grow by using demand-generation tactics. He gained much of his experience and knowledge from his many years in SaaS, including a previous engagement as CMO of Wild Apricot. He continues to share his knowledge in every way possible and is also a mentor for startups and accelerator programs like Techstars and 500 Startups.
The best platform to follow Shiv is LinkedIn.
Claire Suellentrop

Key achievements: Guiding Calendly through its growth phase to $4M ARR.
As the Director of Marketing at Calendly, Claire helped take the company from its infancy to a team of 30 and $4M ARR. With over 10 years in SaaS, she has expertise in product positioning, new user activation, product adoption, and increasing customer LTV.
In 2017, she cofounded Forget the Funnel, a B2B SaaS growth agency that promotes customer-led tactics by leveraging accurate business data. She is also the co-author of a book by the same name, which aims to step people through the process of customer-led growth to reach their revenue targets.
When she’s not deep in work she’s a passionate advocate for quality public services and education, and animal welfare. She has several rescue cats of her own. You can follow her on X or LinkedIn.
Georgiana Laudi

Key achievements: Cofounder and coauthor of Forget the Funnel.
Georgiana is the co-founder and coauthor of Forget the Funnel. She is also a notable speaker and mentor in her own right, having a track record for launching and building B2B and B2C companies since 2000. In 2010, she jumped into marketing and product growth, and her career has skyrocketed ever since.
She’s held previous notable roles such as VP of Product Marketing at Bitly, as well as Advisor at FeedOtter, AgencyAnalytics, and Empower. She frequently attends conferences as a guest speaker and panel representative.
It’s best to follow Georgiana on LinkedIn.
Peep Laja

Key achievements: Serial entrepreneur and founder of marketing course provider CXL.
Peep Laja is an entrepreneur and founder of CXL, a top resource for marketing courses and educational materials. He’s also the man behind Speero, a conversion rate optimization agency, and Wynter, an on-demand B2B market research platform.
Peep started his entrepreneurial journey in Estonia, overcoming language barriers to grow the CXL blog in English. He admits that while he’s great at starting businesses, once he gets it off the ground, there are far better people to take the reins and go from there.
Once voted number 1 most influential conversion rate optimization expert in the world, he’s someone you’ll want to follow. He’s active on X and LinkedIn.
Brian Halligan

Key achievements: Cofounder of HubSpot.
Brian is the cofounder of the popular marketing platform HubSpot and the person who coined the term “inbound marketing”, which we all know so well. He’s also the co-author of 2 books, “Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs” and “Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn from the Most Iconic Band in History” and a senior lecturer at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
His career began in sales before becoming venture partner at Longworth Ventures, which is when he cofounded HubSpot in 2006. In 2014, he was rated one of Glassdoor’s Highest Rated CEO’s. Brian also has an interest in climate tech, and in 2022, he founded Propeller Ventures, a climate tech venture fund spearheading ocean innovation investments.
You can follow him on X, LinkedIn, and Instagram.
Dev Basu

Key achievements: Taking a startup agency to $1 million in sales in its second year.
Finally, here’s our very own, Dev Basu. Dev is the founder and CEO of Powered by Search, a marketing agency that specializes in B2B SaaS companies that aren’t growing fast enough. He’s worked with clients like Basecamp, ClickFunnels, Loopio, and VMware.
Dev secured a valuable placement with Microsoft’s marketing team in the early 2000s, which highlighted a gap in internet search potential for businesses. This is when he started down the SEO path. Dev shares a profile similar to the other founders and influencers recommended in this article – driven, hard-working, and high-achieving. He’s gathered a wealth of knowledge and happily shares this wisdom with others.
You can follow Dev on LinkedIn and X, or check out his blog.
Wrapping Up
A consistent theme among many of these leaders in their field is that they started with a fresh idea and ran with it despite setbacks or criticism. They are witty and knowledgeable, display exemplary leadership skills, and in many ways are breaking the mould for modern SaaS businesses.
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