In this episode, Avanish and Dennis discuss:
- How Freshworks evolved from a single help desk product to a multi-product platform serving 74,000 customers globally, from small businesses to enterprises like Airbus and Nucor Steel
- The importance of being "pulled" by customers into new markets rather than pushing—recognizing when customers you didn't expect are adopting your products
- The challenges of building and scaling a multi-product company where products are at different maturity levels and target slightly different ICPs
- Why ecosystem strategy is critical at Freshworks, including both technology integrations with thousands of partners and a services ecosystem to source and implement solutions
- Freshworks' differentiated approach of building "uncomplicated" solutions in a market dominated by complexity—particularly for mid-market and low-enterprise customers (up to 20,000 employees)
- Dennis's philosophy of customer-centricity: "When in doubt, go talk to a customer"
- Building an ecosystem strategy that includes both technology integrations with thousands of partners and a global services network, with direct sales in nine countries and partner-led expansion everywhere else
About the Host
Avanish Sahai is a Tidemark Fellow and has served as a Board Member of Hubspot since April 2018 and of Birdie.ai since April 2022. Previously, Avanish served as the vice president, ISV and Apps partner ecosystem of Google from 2019 until 2021. From 2016 to 2019, he served as the global vice president, ISV and Technology alliances at ServiceNow. From 2014 to 2015, he was the senior vice president and chief product officer at Demandbase. Prior to Demandbase, Avanish built and led the Appexchange platform ecosystem team at Salesforce, and was an executive at Oracle and McKinsey & Company, as well as various early-to-mid stage startups in Silicon Valley.
About Dennis Woodside
Dennis Woodside is the CEO and President of Freshworks. He joined Freshworks as President in 2022. Dennis has spent more than two decades at innovative companies in Silicon Valley. Previous roles include Chief Operating Officer of Dropbox and sales and strategy leadership roles at Google for more than 10 years, including CEO of Motorola Mobility after Google acquired the company.
Dennis serves on the board of the Boys & Girls Club of the Peninsula in California and previously served on the boards of the American Red Cross and ServiceNow. Dennis holds a B.S. in Industrial Relations from Cornell University and a J.D. from Stanford Law School.
About Freshworks
Freshworks Inc. (NASDAQ: FRSH) provides people-first AI service software that organizations use to deliver exceptional customer and employee experiences. More than 72,000 companies, including American Express, Bridgestone, Databricks, Fila, Nucor, and Sony choose Freshworks’ uncomplicated solutions to increase efficiency and loyalty. For the latest company news and customer stories, visit www.freshworks.com and follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn, and X.
About Tidemark
Tidemark is a venture capital firm, foundation, and community built to serve category-leading technology companies as they scale. Tidemark was founded in 2021 by David Yuan, who has been investing, advising, and building technology companies for over 20 years. Learn more at www.tidemarkcap.com.
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