Why the salestech unicorns stumbled — and what the next generation must learn
The fall of 6Sense, Gainsight, Outreach, Clari, and their peers isn’t just about budgets tightening or playbooks going stale. Those are symptoms. The deeper problem is this:
They were built for a market that no longer exists.
1. SaaS grew up in the “tool era.”
From 2010–2020, the formula was simple:
- Find a friction in the GTM workflow.
- Build a sharper, faster tool.
- Sell it on ROI claims.
In a world of rapid growth, abundant venture capital, and forgiving buyers, that worked. Adoption was imperfect, but momentum carried you. The “tool era” rewarded speed, novelty, and aggressive scaling.
2. Today, buyers want
systems, not tools.
Budgets are constrained. Every CFO is scrutinizing renewals. What survives are not the apps that do “one thing well,” but the systems that:
- Integrate seamlessly into the core workflow,
- Reduce overall tool sprawl,
- Demonstrably save money or protect revenue.
In other words: tools help; systems endure.
3. The real moat is not features — it’s trust and entrenchment.
AI commoditizes features at warp speed. Any clever workflow, scoring model, or sequence builder can be cloned.
But what cannot be cloned as easily is:
- Deep workflow entrenchment (where removing you feels impossible),
- Proprietary data assets (signals, benchmarks, networks),
- Community and trust with practitioners,
- Compliance and security guarantees that take years to build.
The unicorns over-rotated on feature leadership, under-invested in true entrenchment.
4. GTM itself is shifting underfoot.
The classic playbook is load up BDRs, sequence buyers to death — is broken because buyers have moved. They live in communities, Slack groups, WhatsApp chats. They lean on peer validation, not vendor outreach.
A modern GTM engine isn’t about volume. It’s about credibility, access, and resonance. The tools built for volume don’t map to this reality.
5. Where the winners will come from next.
The next generation of GTM platforms will:
- Specialize deeply: vertical SaaS, domain-specific workflows, not generic horizontals.
- Embed invisibly: API-first, integrated into systems buyers already live in.
- Monetize by usage or outcome: aligning cost to realized value, not inflated seat counts.
- Anchor on trust: compliance, data privacy, security, and community as differentiators.
The lesson of 2025 is not that SaaS is dead, or salestech is doomed. It’s that the “tool-first” SaaS era has ended. The winners ahead will be system builders, data owners, and trust brokers.
The 2010s salestech unicorns were the best of their era. But the market has changed eras. If you’re building GTM tech today, don’t chase another tool play. Build something that buyers can’t imagine operating without.