Zendesk

20 statements across 14 episodes · 7 bullish · 1 bearish · 10 people on the record · first statement Jun 2, 2017 by Tomasz Tunguz · said 108 times in 48 episodes since 2017 · across every show →

Mentions by year

brought up most by Jason Lemkin (61), Mikkel Svane (8), Romain Lapeyre (5), Dave Kellogg (5), Abhinav Asthana (4), Girish Mathrubootham (3), Christoph Janz (3), Wade Foster (2)

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05102017201820192020202120222023202420252026episodes it came up in
002.555102017201820192020202120222023202420252026episodesmentions per episode
2026 4 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
2025 23 mentions in 8 episodes 3 per episode
2024 28 mentions in 9 episodes 3 per episode
2023 11 mentions in 8 episodes 1 per episode
2022 14 mentions in 6 episodes 2 per episode
2021 8 mentions in 6 episodes 1 per episode
2020 4 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
2019 4 mentions in 3 episodes 1 per episode
2018 2 mentions in 2 episodes 1 per episode
2017 10 mentions in 2 episodes 5 per episode

every mention, scene by scene, with the transcript →

Everything said about Zendesk, oldest first

Jun 2, 2017 neutral
Insight
Tunguz: AI technology advantages do not automatically lower customer acquisition costs
“Like, let's say you know, you create the next version of Zendesk that's got a whole bunch of ML. It's not necessarily that that technology, you know, that Intel inside technology is going to all of a sudden reduce your cost of customer acquisition relative to …”
Tomasz Tunguz Jun 2, 2017 ▶ 24:15 AI: The New Platform for SaaS
Aug 23, 2017 neutral
Assertion Supported
Yellurkar: Zendesk generated $312M in revenue in 2016
“Three hundred and twelve million dollars in revenue in 2016, that's about three hundred and twelve million dollars more Than when Kristoff and I met you.”
Devdutt Yellurkar Aug 23, 2017 ▶ 2:36 Zendesk From Day 0 to Today: The Lessons Learned
Aug 23, 2017
Assertion Supported
Svane: Zendesk operated with no sales team until $10M run rate
“Until, kind of, our first, you know, until, like, ten million dollars in, in run rate, we didn't have sales. It was all a self-service business.”
Mikkel Svane Aug 23, 2017 ▶ 20:18 Zendesk From Day 0 to Today: The Lessons Learned
Aug 23, 2017 positive
Assertion Supported
Yellurkar: Zendesk broke the 2014 tech IPO logjam
“In 2014 there was a log jam, right? Nobody wanted to take the companies public. Like, there was a big, and you were, actually, you were the jam cracker. You broke that log jam and were the first company to get out.”
Devdutt Yellurkar Aug 23, 2017 ▶ 24:39 Zendesk From Day 0 to Today: The Lessons Learned
Aug 23, 2017
Assertion Supported
Svane: Zendesk Scaled From $0 to $10M ARR in 36 Months
“Zero to one took us 18 months, and one to 10 took us another 18 months, so of course it was a very, very busy 18 months”
Mikkel Svane Aug 23, 2017 ▶ 15:43 Zendesk From Day 0 to Today: The Lessons Learned
Aug 23, 2017
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Svane: Zendesk expanded from small UK division to thousands of Adobe users
“Our first Adobe customer was a small division in the UK, and now we have, you know, thousands of people within Adobe using our software. Same with Disney and a lot of other organizations”
Mikkel Svane Aug 23, 2017 ▶ 24:00 Zendesk From Day 0 to Today: The Lessons Learned
Aug 23, 2017
Assertion Supported
Svane: Zendesk has close to 100,000 business customers globally
“Been on this journey for almost 10 years now and have close to a 100,000 businesses around the world using our software for providing great customer service, great customer engagement.”
Mikkel Svane Aug 23, 2017 ▶ 1:40 Zendesk From Day 0 to Today: The Lessons Learned
Aug 23, 2017 positive
Insight
Svane: Flexible pricing and packaging is competitively disruptive
“Being really flexible with your pricing and your packaging can be really, really competitively disruptive. That you can come with a price point, or you can come with a pricing model that works for your customer, that is almost, that feels designed for their ne…”
Mikkel Svane Aug 23, 2017 ▶ 23:14 Zendesk From Day 0 to Today: The Lessons Learned
Jul 1, 2019 neutral
Disclosure
Slack's early sales team operated out of Zendesk rather than Salesforce
“Early days we had an accounts team and the accounts team would work out of Zendesk, not Salesforce. So it was almost like an extension of customer support and they would talk to a dentist office and the CIO of a fortune 100 company in the same day.”
Danny Herzberg Jul 1, 2019 ▶ 17:09 From Freemium to Enterprise with Slack
Apr 6, 2020 positive
Assertion Supported
Song: Duo Security Scaled $10M-$73M By Hiring Zendesk's GTM Nucleus
“At about ten million, I brought on board, effectively, the nucleus of Zendesk's go-to-market engine. Okay. I brought on board JimSib Jeff Wiss and Zachary Locker, and we basically went from one to three to 10, from 10 to 30 to 73”
Doug Song Apr 6, 2020 ▶ 34:41 Founder Confidential: The Top Things No One Really Tells You About Scaling
Feb 15, 2022
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Postman's founders were its top support ticket solvers for two years
“And for the first two years, Postman founders were the highest ticket solvers with the highest CSAT rates at the company.”
Abhinav Asthana Feb 15, 2022 ▶ 17:08 Building a $5.6B company with a Product-led Flywheel with Postman's CEO Abhinav Asthana
Sep 16, 2022 negative
Assertion Supported
Lemkin: SaaS giants like Zendesk and Intercom offer shitty phone support
“Even support companies do shitty support, and I go on, and I play, I go on to all the leaders, the, I, okay, does, do all the leaders in SaaS, do the Zendesk and the intercoms, and do they answer their phone and say, none of them do either, right?”
Jason Lemkin Sep 16, 2022 ▶ 41:19 Live from SaaStr Annual 2022: AMA with SaaStr's CEO
Sep 3, 2023 neutral
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Benioff dismissed early Zendesk threats to Salesforce to avoid fear-based leadership
“I did a year at Salesforce in the middle of all that, and I was mentioning Zendesk. I was like, hey, there's these guys called Zendesk, and they might be a problem for, like, our customer service business and I got the kind of uh-oh moment where, like, oh, and…”
Dave Kellogg Sep 3, 2023 ▶ 16:28 "The Top 5 Questions Every CEO Wrestles With Dave Kellogg, ex-CEO Host Analytics": SaaStr Classic
Sep 15, 2023 positive
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Mathrubootham: 2011 Hacker News response cemented Freshdesk as Zendesk alternative
“We responded to the website, we exposed what was happening, and the whole internet community, we were on Hacker News, For 30 hours at the top post, and for three days on the top page, the entire community supported us, and from that point onwards, like Freshde…”
Girish Mathrubootham Sep 15, 2023 ▶ 29:12 Building a Global SaaS Empire | Freshworks Founder & CEO Girish Mathrubootham on His Biggest Bets
Sep 27, 2023 positive
Opinion
Incumbent SaaS Giants Are Adopting AI Rapidly, Avoiding Dinosaur Fate
“The learning is that the bigger SaaS companies are pretty fast to embrace AI, so it's not like they are the dinosaurs from the on-premise world that didn't manage to move to the cloud. If you look at what Intercom, HubSpot, Notion, Zendesk, and others are doin…”
Christoph Janz Sep 27, 2023 ▶ 21:43 What it Takes to Raise Capital with Christoph Janz of Point Nine
Sep 6, 2024 bullish
Insight
Lemkin: Vertical SaaS will surge because SMBs cannot find human workers
“I think in the enterprise AI and automation are about cutting headcount. Let's cut half of the thousand agents we have doing support. My thesis is vertical SAS is blowing is going to blow up because there just aren't anyone to do the work. There's just no, fir…”
Jason Lemkin Sep 6, 2024 ▶ 25:11 Why Vertical SaaS is Booming, And How to Get 110% NRR from SMBs, with Jason Lemkin + Mangomint's CEO
Oct 15, 2024 neutral
Assertion Partly supported
Lemkin: SaaS vendors promise AI can cut 30% to 50% of staff
“Everyone in post sales, Salesforce, Intercom, Zendesk, Gorgeous, on and on. They are promising you can eliminate. 30 to 50% of your humans in support with AI. They're promising it today.”
Jason Lemkin Oct 15, 2024 ▶ 17:28 The Era of HyperFunctional SaaS is Here l SaaStr CEO and Founder Jason Lemkin
Nov 4, 2024 positive
Assertion Partly supported
Lemkin: Customer Support SaaS Platforms Are Converging on Per-Resolution Pricing
“Even in this sort of odd per resolution model in, in post sales support. I think everyone, Zendesk, intercom, customer, gorgeous, dial, even dial pad, even in other areas, I think they all converging on the same model.”
Jason Lemkin Nov 4, 2024 ▶ 42:56 What Really Matters in SaaS in 2025 with Jason Lemkin and Dave Kellogg
Dec 27, 2024 neutral
Assertion Supported
Lemkin: Agentforce charges $2 per AI resolution, Intercom $1, Zendesk $1.11
“It's two bucks. Okay. Finn for intercom is one buck. Zendesk is like a dollar and 11 cents.”
Jason Lemkin Dec 27, 2024 ▶ 34:45 HubSpot Co-Founder and Chair Brian Halligan on AI and SaaS, Board Meetings, and When Incumbents Win
Dec 10, 2025 neutral
Assertion Supported
Lemkin: Zendesk automates 60-80% of enterprise support versus 20% for self-serve
“With our top Customers at Zendesk, we can automate 60 to 80% of support and related interactions. Okay. Makes sense. They train them for months, sometimes for months at Zendesk for their big customers. For our Self Survey AI, it's 20%.”
Jason Lemkin Dec 10, 2025 ▶ 42:16 How to Use AI to Hyper-Customize Go-To-Market at Scale with SaaStr's CEO and Chief AI Officer
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