eugenio-pace-new-avatar

Pace co-founded Auth0 in early 2013 with CTO and “brother-in-arms” Matias Woloski while living 7,000 miles apart from each other. Since then, Pace has played an instrumental role in growing Auth0 into a leading identity management company that is loved by developers and trusted by global enterprises. He loves traveling and has visited more than 35 countries for business and pleasure. He currently lives in Redmond, Washington with his wife, two sons, and their labrador retriever. In his spare time, he enjoys the outdoors, rowing, riding bikes, spending time with his family, restoring his 1970 Karmann Ghia, writing his blog, and reading history and philosophy.

CEO and Co-Founder

Eugenio Pace

Identity leaders combine developer and enterprise expertise, offering customers more flexibility

Okta, Inc, today (May 3, 2021) announced the successful completion of its acquisition of Auth0. Together, Okta and Auth0 address a broad set of digital identity use cases, providing secure access and enabling everyone to safely use any technology. 

Auth0 will operate as an independent business unit within Okta, led by Auth0 Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder Eugenio Pace, reporting directly to Todd McKinnon, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Okta. Both Okta’s and Auth0’s platforms will be supported, invested in, and integrated over time — accelerating innovation and making the Okta Identity Cloud even more compelling for the full spectrum of customers and users. 

“Identity is one of the most strategic investments an organization will make today. A single, unified identity platform has the power to transform an organization by providing seamless and secure access for both customers and employees,” said McKinnon. “Okta and Auth0 have always shared a vision for the identity market. We’re also both cloud-first, customer-first companies. By joining forces, we’ll give our customers more choice and flexibility, driving tremendous value and enabling them to accelerate innovation. Together, we will shape the future of identity on the internet, empowering developers to build with identity at the foundation.”

"As Okta and Auth0 join forces today, bringing together two exceptional companies, I'm more confident than ever that we will deliver on our shared vision to secure access for everyone," said Pace. "Auth0's focus has always been on enabling product builders to innovate, and now as one company with a shared vision and combined resources, that innovation will only increase."

Okta’s and Auth0’s comprehensive, complementary, and flexible identity platforms solve every identity use case, regardless of the audience or user. Okta pioneered cloud-based identity, offering enterprise-grade reliability and world-class security while prioritizing customer success for organizations of all sizes. Auth0 was built by developers for developers. Application builders around the world are loyal to Auth0 for its extensibility, ease of use, scope of documentation, and developer-friendly experience. With combined expertise across developer communities and the enterprise, Okta and Auth0 will provide enhanced depth and breadth of identity solutions and will be even better suited to integrate quickly into the modern tech stack of today’s developers. 

“At Kiva, we’re on a mission to expand financial access to help underserved communities around the world thrive. Identity plays an essential role in making that happen," said Ken Leung, EVP of Engineering, Kiva. "Today, we leverage Auth0 to provide secure authentication to Kiva's partners and lenders, and Okta for workforce identity, giving our team access to the critical technologies they need to best serve the millions of global entrepreneurs in our network.  We trust both Okta and Auth0 to connect our people and technology, and are excited to see how they evolve and innovate together."

“Credence goes to those who can help us identify one another in a digital world,” said Jay Bretzmann, Program Director for Cybersecurity Products, IDC.  “Okta and Auth0 provide the cloud-ready, developer-friendly tools to help in the fight. They're building the platforms and technology we’ll need to take the next steps. Simple, elegant, and customer-centric." 

## Cautionary Language Concerning Forward-Looking Statements

This blog contains forward-looking statements relating to expectations, plans, and prospects including statements relating to the anticipated benefits that will be derived from this transaction, the expected acceleration of Okta’s growth as a result of this transaction, the impact to the Okta Identity Cloud, expected synergies resulting from the transaction and expansion of Okta’s customer base. These forward-looking statements are based upon the current expectations and beliefs of Okta’s management as of the date of this release and are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements including, without limitation, the risk of adverse and unpredictable macro-economic conditions, the failure to achieve expected synergies and efficiencies of operations between Okta and Auth0, the ability of Okta and Auth0 to successfully integrate their respective businesses, the failure to timely develop and achieve market acceptance of the combined business, the loss of any Auth0 customers, the ability to coordinate strategy and resources between Okta and Auth0, and the ability of Okta and Auth0 to retain and motivate key employees of Auth0. Additional factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements are detailed from time to time in the reports Okta files with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including in Okta’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2021. All forward-looking statements in this press release are based on information available to Okta as of the date hereof, and Okta disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements.

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

Okta Completes Acquisition of Auth0

Okta and Auth0 address a broad set of identity use cases and the acquisition will accelerate the companies’ shared vision of enabling everyone to safely use any technology, shaping the future of identity on the internet



Okta, Inc. (NASDAQ:Okta) announced on 3/3/2021 that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Auth0 in a stock transaction valued at approximately $6.5 billion. Together, Okta and Auth0 address a broad set of identity use cases, and the acquisition will accelerate the companies’ shared vision of enabling everyone to safely use any technology, shaping the future of identity on the internet. 

Auth0 will operate as an independent unit inside of Okta, and both platforms will be supported and invested in. As a result, organizations will have a wider breadth of identity solutions to fit their unique needs. Okta and Auth0’s comprehensive, complementary identity platforms are robust enough to serve the world’s largest organizations and flexible enough to address every identity use case, regardless of the audience or user.  

“Combining Auth0’s developer-centric identity platform with the Okta Identity Cloud will drive tremendous value to both current and future customers,” said Todd McKinnon, Chief Executive Officer, and co-founder, Okta. “In an increasingly digital world, identity is the unifying means by which we use technology — both at work and in our personal lives. With so much at stake for businesses today, it’s critical that we deliver trusted customer-facing identity solutions. Okta’s and Auth0’s shared vision for the identity market, rooted in customer success, will accelerate our innovation, opening up new ways for our customers to leverage identity to meet their business needs.”

“I started my career as a developer,” McKinnon added. “Over the years, I’ve seen developers become more important than ever. They are the ones building every experience on the internet. Auth0’s DNA is rooted in developers, and I’ve always admired their sharp focus and leadership in developer-led identity.”

With continued global market tailwinds of cloud and hybrid IT, digital transformation, and zero-trust security, an identity platform has become one of the most critical technology investments an organization will make. These trends have accelerated over the past year as companies of all sizes and across every industry had to pivot quickly to deliver engaging customer experiences online. Organizations everywhere are rapidly leveraging identity to streamline processes, reduce costs, maintain the highest levels of security, and improve customer experiences to drive business growth. Okta and Auth0 are both committed to delivering innovation and value to organizations navigating those transformations. 

“Okta and Auth0 have an incredible opportunity to build the identity platform of the future,” said Eugenio Pace, Chief Executive Officer, and co-founder, Auth0. “We founded Auth0 to enable product builders to innovate with a secure, easy-to-use, and extensible customer identity platform. Together, we can offer our customers workforce and customer identity solutions with exceptional speed, simplicity, security, reliability, and scalability. By joining forces, we will accelerate our customers’ innovation and ability to meet the needs and demands of consumers, businesses, and employees everywhere.”

Learn more about this announcement: [https://www.okta.com/blog/2021/03/okta-auth0-powering-identity-for-the-internet/](https://www.okta.com/blog/2021/03/okta-auth0-powering-identity-for-the-internet/)


Okta Signs Definitive Agreement to Acquire Auth0

jenny-obrien

I'm a former business journalist who's fascinated by the intersection of tech and business strategy — in particular how the right solution can transform an idea into reality. I specialize in ROI, data privacy, and identity.

Business Content Manager

Jenny O'Brien

These days, data privacy can make or break Mergers & Acquisitions


Merger and acquisition (M&A) deals can take years to put together, and they involve hundreds of moving parts, but it takes only one faulty element to turn a deal from a success story to a cautionary tale — especially if that element is cybersecurity.

According to one survey by Forescout Technologies, [53%](https://www.forescout.com/company/news/press-releases/forescout-study-reveals-cybersecurity-concerns-on-merger-and-acquisition-activity/) of respondents reported that their organization had encountered a critical cybersecurity issue during an M&A deal that put the deal into jeopardy, and 65% of respondents experienced regret after closing a deal because of cybersecurity concerns.

In the current regulatory environment, with the passage of the [GDPR and the CCPA](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/GDPR-vs-CCPA), and with more data privacy laws in the works, cybersecurity, and data privacy have become crucial elements of pre-M&A due diligence. If an acquiring company doesn’t like what they find, they may walk away from the deal or later wish they had.

Here, let’s go over three recent M&A transactions that never got off the ground or whose deal value was severely undermined by data security issues.

## Facebook Walks Away From Tiktok’s Forebear
[_Fortune_](https://fortune.com/2019/11/13/facebook-musically-tiktok-bytedance-acquisition/) reports that in 2016, Facebook spent months considering a possible acquisition of Musical.ly, which later became TikTok, the massively popular video app. Facebook passed on the deal because of two concerns: the app was based in China, and its predominately underage user base would likely run afoul of American laws governing child internet privacy.

After Facebook opted out, Musical.ly went on to be acquired by Beijing-based startup ByteDance for $1 billion. Today, TikTok is a runaway hit with [over a billion](https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/20/tech/tiktok-bytedance-users/index.html) active users, but it's grappling with the same cybersecurity issues that made Facebook walk away, and those may even threaten ByteDance's acquisition.

In November 2019, [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tiktok-cfius-exclusive/exclusive-u-s-opens-national-security-investigation-into-tiktok-sources-idUSKBN1XB4IL) reported that ByteDance was being investigated by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) because of national security concerns. Apparently, lawmakers were alarmed by [reports from TikTok employees](https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/11/05/inside-tiktok-culture-clash-where-us-views-about-censorship-often-were-overridden-by-chinese-bosses/) that their bosses in China compelled them to censor videos, including political content. There were also concerns about the security of the app’s data on U.S. users, and in December, ByteDance was hit with a [class-action lawsuit](https://www.bbc.com/news/business-50640110) in California. The suit claims that TikTok collects and stores “vast quantities” of user information without consent and then sends that data to servers in China, in violation of multiple laws.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="What made @facebook walk away from TikTok. #mergersandacquisitions #lessons"/>

ByteDance has attempted to address these concerns by fencing off its U.S. operations from China, but if they fail to convince CFIUS, the committee may force ByteDance to divest from its holdings of Musical.ly, effectively reversing the acquisition. It wouldn’t be the first time CFIUS has intervened in M&A deals over data privacy concerns. In recent years, lawmakers have been vigilant about policing cross-border M&A deals, especially between tech companies.

In 2017, CFIUS refused to allow China’s Ant Financial to buy MoneyGram due to worries about the security of personally identifiable data of Americans, and last year, CFIUS forced Chinese company Kunlun Tech Co Ltd to sell the gay dating app [Grindr](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-grindr-m-a-exclusive/exclusive-us-pushes-chinese-owner-of-grindr-to-divest-the-dating-app-sources-idUSKCN1R809L). All of these stories point to the necessity of keeping data privacy top of mind when considering an international M&A deal, especially one with China.

## Verizon’s Acquisition of Yahoo Unearths a Privacy Nightmare
In 2017, [Verizon acquired Yahoo](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/06/13/its-official-verizon-finally-buys-yahoo/) for $4.48 billion, but the deal almost fell through over two data-breach scandals that came to light in the midst of negotiations.

Yahoo revealed that they had suffered two separate data breaches, which they had not made public. In the first breach, a hacker stole the personal data of at least 500 million users, including some unencrypted passwords and answers to security questions. As [TechCrunch](https://techcrunch.com/2016/09/22/yahoo-confirms-state-sponsored-attacker-stole-personal-data-of-at-least-500-million-users/) reported at the time: “With the answers to security questions, a hacker could easily jump through a number of online forms to reset users’ passwords on sites where an additional means of account verification — like two-factor authentication — is not involved.”

In the second breach (widely reported to have been carried out by a state-sponsored actor), 1 billion accounts were compromised, and again personal information and login credentials were stolen. Yahoo’s chief information security officer reported that stolen passwords were hashed using MD5, but [tech insiders countered](https://techcrunch.com/2016/12/14/yahoo-discloses-hack-of-1-billion-accounts/) that MD5 was an outdated and insecure form of hashing that could easily be cracked to reveal the passwords.

In the end, Verizon went ahead with the acquisition of Yahoo but knocked $350 million off the purchase price. Verizon also agreed to share legal liability for the breaches with Yahoo. It was a costly inheritance, and, coupled with the PR fallout, it damaged the deal’s value in ways that will doubtlessly be felt for years.

In the wake of this scandal-plagued acquisition, the [SEC issued new guidelines](https://www.sec.gov/rules/interp/2018/33-10459.pdf') for cybersecurity disclosures, so neither shareholders, customers, nor acquiring companies are kept in the dark about a data breach. Nevertheless, the Verizon-Yahoo story has made mergers and acquisitions dealmakers take a closer look at cybersecurity during due diligence in order to determine whether the target company has appropriate security in place to be legally compliant.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Why @verizon’s acquisition of @yahoo unearthed a privacy nightmare. #mergersandacquisitions #lessons"/>

## Marriott Acquires Starwood... and a Major It Headache
In 2016, [Marriott International purchased](https://www.cnbc.com/2016/09/23/marriott-buys-starwood-becoming-worlds-largest-hotel-chain.html) Starwood Hotels & Resorts for $13.3 billion, forming the largest hotel chain in the world. Despite initial enthusiasm for this megadeal, it has been fraught with difficulties, many stemming from problems integrating software between the two chains’ operations. Two years into the merger, the two chains still struggled to transform into a truly combined company, with [some hotels reporting](https://skift.com/2018/08/07/marriott-still-working-through-starwood-integration-two-years-after-deal/) that the transition to a new salesforce system got in the way of sales.

Then, in 2018, Marriott revealed that Starwood had suffered a massive data breach, in which nearly 400 million guest records were exposed through a security flaw in Starwood’s reservation system. The flaw in Starwood’s system had existed since 2014, long predating Marriott’s acquisition. But when the breach was discovered in 2018, two years after the deal, Starwood’s reservation system still hadn’t been migrated to Marriott’s.

In light of this, Marriott was hit with a [$123 million GDPR](https://www.forbes.com/sites/kateoflahertyuk/2019/07/09/marriott-faces-gdpr-fine-of-123-million/#1c7e3c654525) fine by Britain’s Information Commissioner's Office (ICO). In a [statement](https://ico.org.uk/about-the-ico/news-and-events/news-and-blogs/2019/07/statement-intention-to-fine-marriott-international-inc-more-than-99-million-under-gdpr-for-data-breach/), Britain’s information commissioner, Elizabeth Denham, said, “The GDPR makes it clear that organizations must be accountable for the personal data they hold. This can include carrying out proper due diligence when making a corporate acquisition, and putting in place proper accountability measures to assess not only what personal data has been acquired, but also how it is protected.”

## Don’t Let Data Privacy Derail Your M&A Deal
The one thing all these M&A disasters have in common is that they could have been prevented, or at least mitigated, had the companies in question known what warning signs to look for. Each of these companies (both the acquirers and the acquired companies) could have benefited from the expertise of dedicated identity-management professionals.

The right partners could have implemented cutting-edge encryption for Yahoo’s personal information, could have integrated Marriott and Starwood’s systems more quickly and could have advised TikTok on the importance of data siloing in cross-border M&As.

In the year to come, investors will surely take these lessons to heart. Even though M&A activity is predicted to be robust in 2020, it will doubtlessly be tempered by caution around cybersecurity to ensure that these issues don't prevent M&A transactions from providing a return on investment.

If your business is in the M&A market, and you’d like to make sure it doesn’t have any cybersecurity skeletons in its closet, [reach out to the team at Auth0](mailto:sales@auth0.com).


Recent M&A Deals that Imploded Over Cybersecurity

df6c864847fba9687d962cb80b482764?size=200 avatar

df6c864847fba9687d962cb80b482764?size=200

Martin Gontovnikas, a.k.a Gonto, is a software engineer at heart who moved to the ‘dark side’ and became VP of Marketing at Auth0. He considers himself lucky to have found a way to combine his two passions and apply his engineering thinking model to marketing.<br/><br/> Gonto’s analytical thinking is a huge driver of his data-driven approach to marketing strategy and experimental design. He is based in the Bay area, and in his spare time, can be found eating gourmet food at the best new restaurants, visiting every local brewery he can find, or traveling the globe in search of new experiences.

Former SVP of Marketing and Growth at Auth0

Martin Gontovnikas

New customer acquisitions channels await if you can walk the tightrope between B2B and B2C.


> Customer acquisition costs can make or break a business. 

The more it costs to acquire a customer, the more value businesses have to get from that customer to make a profit. If the value of each customer is less than the money it takes to acquire them, no investor's wallet will be deep enough to sustain the company for the long term. 

Some companies are turning to other businesses to acquire customers, developing business models that tie mutually beneficial links between the companies and their customers. In this model, called B2B2C, one business offers a service to a business that needs it, but the first business retains the customers it gains. 

Grubhub, a popular delivery app, is an example. When you order your dinner through Grubhub, you can access dozens of restaurants in your local area. You're simultaneously the customer of Grubhub and whichever restaurant you choose. GrubHub didn't sell their product to the restaurant (B2B), nor did they make the food you're about to eat (B2C). This is the B2B2C business model in action. 

B2B2C offers a compelling mix of B2B and B2C advantages to startups searching for product-market fit and to established companies looking to acquire new customers. When done right, it's win-win-win for both of the businesses and their customers. 

## What is B2B2C?

B2B2C describes a business model where your company sells a product or service to another business, which gets you access to customers you get to keep and use. Here are the key differentiators for B2B2C:

1. Your business offers a horizontal solution to another business's problem.
2. The other business's customers recognize that they're also your customers.

![Image of Business to business to consumer acronym (B2B2C)](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/u2b5DKGwQGoT0HFSNvDwq/50d62116826610c3c7734a26a9903c40/b2b2c-separator-01.png)

Take another look at Grubhub: It sells a horizontal feature to the restaurants around you. Many of them can't offer delivery, and most of them don't have the funds to build out a consumer-facing app—much less provide customer support for it. 

If a restaurant partners with Grubhub, they get to offer their previous customers a new feature, potentially resulting in more orders and higher customer satisfaction. When Grubhub partners with a restaurant, they get access to those customers and can maintain that relationship as they order from other restaurants in other locations. 

The B2B2C model is more than a mutually beneficial relationship between businesses: It requires that customers develop direct but separable relationships with both brands.  

Your local grocery store didn't form a B2B2C relationship with Coca-Cola to sell soda. This is a vendor relationship: Coca-Cola sells their product at wholesale to another business, which sells it to you for a marked-up price; Coca-Cola doesn't sell soda to you directly. 

Another easy-to-mix-up B2B relationship is white labeling. Take [Bread, for example](https://www.getbread.com/blog/truth-about-white-labeling/). Bread offers a white-labeled product for stores that want to offer financing. You might notice a horizontal value here. But the nature of a white-label relationship is that customers don't know they're using Bread; they just know there's a new button when they check out.  

In a true B2B2C deal, the business you're selling to gets a problem solved, and your business gets access to a new customer base that isn't fixed to the prior business. 

## Why B2B2C Can Create Strategic Customer Growth

B2B2C deals combine two of the best features from B2C and B2B models: network effects and predictable growth plans. 

If you acquire entire customer bases through B2B2C deals, you can use that data to fuel further acquisition and iteration. The more you know about your customers, the better you can find them and serve them. 

Network effects are typically the domain of B2C companies — Facebook and Google being [prime examples](https://stratechery.com/2018/the-moat-map/). Unfortunately for other B2C companies, network effects have discouraging, downstream influences. Google's product improves as it acquires users, which means that any Google competitors have to find ways to improve their product without the same access to feedback. 

With a B2B2C model, you can get around some of those effects. Each B2B2C deal offers you customers and data, but you can build on those network effects in chunks rather than drips. With this kind of acquisition, you can plan for network effects. 

OpenTable, a B2B2C company that offers online reservations with restaurants, builds network effects into its email marketing. Initial user acquisition typically starts with users seeking a reservation to a local restaurant, but once users join the service, they get restaurant recommendations tailored to them based on users in their area. 

![OpenTable web site screenshot](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/4UXoeaHxiRqDirf84Nx5Xm/7759092d29a0a3794befa9da5ea8e1f7/open-table)

With network effects providing a tailwind, OpenTable's horizontal service shows users that they're now OpenTable customers and that there's value in being an active participant in the service.  

By making deals with businesses instead of navigating waves of consumer trends, you can also make a more predictable, long-term growth plan. 

Hero, another company with a B2B2C business model, has this planning potential. Hero enables retail employees in physical stores to connect with online shoppers through chat and live video. 

![Hero live from showroom application](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/2GtFDECEq6H2GISKqnJ3x7/a4acaa4798fc466e589d33721715eaf6/hero-showroom)
*[Source](https://blog.usehero.com/selling-iconic-designs-online-how-jonathan-adler-maximizes-its-stores-potential-with-hero-e344f5c94694)*

Hero provides a digital layer for physical retailers. That way, physical retailers can still interact with online consumers by showing them products and sharing information.

Instead of acquiring users directly, Hero can chart its growth against a much smaller selection of stores and chains. 

This growth plan is advantageous because B2B companies [tend to have less churn](https://www.profitwell.com/blog/how-b2b-and-b2c-companies-solve-churn-for-different-customers) than B2C companies. Consumers have a wide variety of services to turn to, and might churn because they lose interest, find a better product, or decide they could no longer afford it. B2B companies try to solve business problems, so client interest isn't as likely to wane and there might not be many alternatives if the market is niche. 

With B2B sales, you can focus on building a sales team that pursues and maintains fewer, but larger,  accounts. As each B2B client offers a group of customers, you can still [get the data](https://auth0.com/blog/three-tools-to-improve-your-customer-intelligence/) that cultivates successful B2C growth. 

A B2B2C company can iterate its service with each customer but plan its growth with each client. 

## B2B2C Customers Need Identity Infrastructure

B2B2C business models rely on an infrastructure that enables cross-platform user management. With white-labeled [identity infrastructure](https://auth0.com/blog/what-is-identity-infrastructure/) from Auth0, you can make authentication seamless and secure so that customers can focus on using and enjoying your product.

### Single Sign On (SSO)

Asking users to remember another set of credentials is a big request. According to a Digital Guardian survey, [nearly a third of users](https://digitalguardian.com/blog/uncovering-password-habits-are-users-password-security-habits-improving-infographic) already have too many password-protected credentials to count. If they're trying your service out for the first time, you don’t want to create friction.

Look at the identity needs of a [company like GO1](https://auth0.com/learn/go1-adaptable-authentication-service-built-scale/), for instance. GO1 is a B2B2C company that works with learning management system providers to build a repository of compliance and professional development content. With one subscription, end-users get access to this volume of valuable content, and businesses can better enable employee growth. 

Seamless authentication is key for this level of engagement. Self-development isn’t always easy, and users facing a login screen every time they want to view a resource or test a new module could make the experience even harder. GO1’s long-term success rests on consistently showing users the value of new knowledge and making it simple for them to pursue it.

![The Go1 Site screenshot](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/453YMGqqDX01MzeD1ETKmR/0aec12fee74f33cd95e9f24fc5f971a7/go1-site)

[Single Sign On (SSO)](https://auth0.com/blog/what-is-and-how-does-single-sign-on-work/) enables users to log in with one set of credentials — and stay logged in — creating a seamless experience that lets the GO1 product shine through. 

As GO1 expands to new use cases, such as enabling job search companies to prompt their applicants to complete training via GO1 before applying, the authentication experience becomes even more important. Expansion requires integrating with different authentication protocols, such as SAML and LDAP. An outsourced identity provider can help you consistently [scale a high-level authentication experience](https://auth0.com/blog/the-real-roi-of-auth0-part-2-innovation/) without consuming your developer resources. 

### Security and Privacy

A B2B2C business model also relies on the ability to safely manage users. 

If you want to sell another business on your service, the advantages of that deal need to outweigh the risk associated with introducing a third party. The network effects that make a B2B2C deal valuable depend on data, so your customers need to be able to trust you with that data. 

Since B2B2C typically involves one business positioning its service as an add-on to another business's service, a [data breach](https://auth0.com/blog/what-is-a-data-breach/) can be especially dangerous. Users are already getting value from the main service, so if your security practices develop a poor reputation, you'll be easy to avoid. And if the [data breach is high profile](https://auth0.com/blog/11-of-the-worst-data-breaches-in-media/), the main business might drop your service to keep its users safe. 

Auth0 is a trusted, vetted identity provider, as proven by our adherence to best-in-class [compliance frameworks](https://auth0.com/security/). By offering robust security features, you can demonstrate to users, and the business offering them to you, that you can treat their data with care. 

Counterintuitively, adding security also grants you the opportunity to learn more about your users. Auth0 offers [progressive profiling tools](https://auth0.com/blog/how-profile-enrichment-and-progressive-profiling-can-boost-your-marketing/) so that you can learn more about your customers over time. Rather than barrage them with questions all at once, you can get different bits of information every time they log in: their name the first time, their address the second, their industry the third, and so on. 

Security can bolster, not slow down, your network effects. 

### Branding and White Labeling 

An essential feature of a successful B2B2C relationship is that your newly acquired customers actually identify as your customers. If your brand name merely flashes by as customers proceed with their normal flows, then you're not getting the full value of the B2B2C deal. 

The B2B2C relationship is already fairly complex, and customers are liable to confuse which business they need to contact for support in different contexts. If you can white label any of the supporting infrastructures you need to manage users, your relationship with them will be simpler. 

With Auth0's [Guardian](https://auth0.com/multifactor-authentication), you can build a multi-factor authentication application that matches your brand's look and feel. Combined with an extensive JavaScript library, you can further customize Guardian to your specific needs. 

Branding is powerful, and with the right tools, your customers are better able to see your service and remember its value. 

## Is Your Business Right for B2B2C?

B2B2C relies on aligned incentives and on businesses that can maintain that alignment. 

The business you're selling to has to want another brand involved, not just your service or solution. If that business only wants a new feature, a true B2B2C deal will be difficult to strike and hard to maintain. 

Look for these deals by pursuing companies that already offer a range of services or products. They'll likely be more open to adding yours to their portfolio. If you come into the deal with a well-run customer success team, you can [pitch that support](https://blog.getbase.com/sales-support-drive-acquisition). The less that business has to worry about the problems your solution might introduce for their customers, the better.  

B2B2C can be your core business model, or it can be a growth stage. Uber started as a digital, on-demand cab service; now it offers delivery at scale through Uber Eats. Instacart started as a grocery delivery service, but there's speculation it might [pivot to B2C](https://www.forbes.com/sites/brittainladd/2019/02/11/killing-instacart-why-the-company-is-at-risk-of-crashing-to-the-ground/#551d52d536e8) by leveraging user data to open its own grocery stores. 

To strike a B2B2C deal, your service has to offer horizontal value. To succeed with a B2B2C deal, new users have to identify as your customers. 

Getting the deal depends on a good sales team and the right product alignment. Succeeding with the deal depends on supporting users with the right identity infrastructure and the best authentication experience.  

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />


B2B2C Customer Acquisition Needs Identity Infrastructure

2b7b341132c3df90155a9914f13b6deb

Former Auth0 Employee

Zach Walchuk

The growing importance of Identity and Access Management calls for a buy plus build future.



Any company with an online presence will, at some point, face the decision of whether to build identity services in-house or have them provided by an external, third-party vendor. In the past, it was possible to [argue for the benefits](https://auth0.com/blog/when-to-build-and-when-to-buy/) of either approach. But recent acquisitions of major Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM) providers highlight a growing trend: identity solutions are becoming a crucial component in the architecture of many digital businesses, and relying on in-house expertise may no longer be enough to keep up.

## Identity and Access Management’s Growing Importance

Even the most basic user information, if exposed, can be utilized by sophisticated, automated phishing campaigns to gain expanded access to a user’s sensitive data. The number and variety of online security concerns increases daily, and the cost of [data breaches](https://auth0.com/blog/what-is-a-data-breach/) continues to grow. The rise in breaches has triggered an increase in regulatory oversight, including the European Union’s [General Data Protection Regulation](https://auth0.com/gdpr/) (GDPR) and California’s Consumer Privacy Act, making protection of user data a primary concern. The majority of digital businesses do not have the in-house expertise to stay on top of compliance requirements.

For Akamai Technologies, the solution to this challenge was the acquisition of CIAM pioneer Janrain. On Monday, January 7th, [Akamai announced](https://www.akamai.com/us/en/about/news/press/2019-press/akamai-to-add-customer-identity-access-management-capability-to-enhance-digital-trust-by-acquiring-janrain.jsp) they would be integrating Janrain’s Identity Cloud into their Intelligent Edge Platform, providing CIAM services to Akamai’s enterprise clients. With this acquisition, Akamai also hopes to gain more visibility into online customer behavior, which could be used to drive improvements to their bot management and threat intelligence offerings.

Enterprise users of Akamai will benefit from the new capabilities, but it remains to be seen whether Janrain’s CIAM solution will remain a good fit for all businesses. As we discussed with [SAP’s 2017 acquisition of Gigya](https://auth0.com/blog/sap-to-acquire-gigya-whats-next-for-identity-management/), when choosing an IAM provider, it’s important to understand if identity and security are the core competencies of the company. [SAP’s stated goal](https://www.gigya.com/gigya-the-market-leader-in-customer-identity-and-access-management-to-be-acquired-by-sap/) with the acquisition of Gigya was to enrich customer profiles for effective targeting in marketing, sales, and service approaches. This is a different end use than Akamai’s, but the value provided to the acquiring companies and their enterprise customers with the addition of an IAM solution is the same: trusted technologies for establishing a user’s identity and preferences. The value to businesses looking primarily for an identity provider is less clear, as the companies providing these services no longer have an identity focus.

## The Evolution of Build vs. Buy in IAM

For both Akamai and SAP, the build vs. buy decision became irrelevant — through acquisition, they maintained full control of their IAM capabilities without having to build them from scratch. But acquisition isn’t an option available to most businesses.

Luckily, the possibilities are not limited to building from scratch or outright acquisition. Many Identity as a Service (IDaaS) providers offer extensive customization capabilities. This extensibility gives businesses a great degree of control over the look and behavior of their access solutions. Customizations range from simple things, such as [branding the login page](https://auth0.com/docs/hosted-pages/login) to match the company website, all the way to [rules for handling advanced authorization logic](https://auth0.com/docs/rules). A flexible IDaaS solution may also offer options for [integrating with external services](https://auth0.com/learn/go1-adaptable-authentication-service-built-scale/), custom databases, and other identity providers, allowing businesses to maintain existing capabilities while still delivering a seamless customer experience.

These capabilities bring the conversation away from the **build vs. buy** dynamic and towards a **buy plus build** future: buy core Identity and Access Management capabilities from a trusted, independent IDaaS vendor, and build the pieces you need to fit your business. With a buy plus build model, the cost and time required to implement and maintain an identity solution can be [kept to a minimum](https://auth0.com/learn/dashthis-implements-seconds-auth0/) without sacrificing flexibility. And as compliance and security requirements change, IDaaS customers will benefit from updates to the service as a whole, freeing time and resources to focus on business needs.

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

What Akamai's Acquisition of Janrain Says for Build vs. Buy

diegopoza

System Engineer, geek, foodie, technology lover, speaker.

Sr Manager, Developer Advocacy

Diego Poza

For SaaS companies, offering a free trial is crucial for growth. Find out how to determine the right trial length for your product to boost customer acquisition.



A lot of young SaaS companies are skeptical of free trials. Offer a free trial, the thinking goes, and you’ll attract a bunch of freeloaders who have no intention of sticking with your product once the trial ends. As a young startup, servicing a huge customer base that will never pay you is something you can't afford.

But if your free trial is done right, you’ll actually see a huge boost in customer acquisition. In fact, many massively successful companies have free trials as a central part of their acquisition strategy—Netflix’s free trial has an estimated conversion rate of [93%](http://www.insideredbox.com/rise-in-netflix-free-subscriptions-a-cause-for-concern/),  and AOL built a [$166 billion](http://blogs.reuters.com/rolfe-winkler/2009/07/28/aols-valuation-off-97-from-peak-good-investment/) dollar company using those “10 Free Hours” CDs you used to [throw out](http://mashable.com/2014/08/21/aol-disc-marketing-jan-brandt/#SI4SyC1LXaqE).

If you want to boost your acquisition rate, a free trial is your best bet, but in order to convert free users to paid users, you must provide high-quality content, pick the right trial length, and connect with users at two critical moments.

## Why Content Is The Key To A High-Conversion Free Trial Program

When a prospective customer tries out your free trial, you can’t just dump them on your dashboard and expect them to hit the ground running. A free trial is an audition, and you need to do everything you can to educate prospects about how your product can solve their problems. This means high-quality content, and a lot of it.

For example, at Auth0 we don’t expect that every one of our customers will be a code aficionado, able to seamlessly integrate Auth0 across their platform with no questions at all. That's why we publish content like our recent video on [setting up Auth0 Lock](https://auth0.com/video-tutorials/getting-started-with-lock/implementing-lock), which includes step-by-step instructions and example code like this:

![growth free trial lock Auth0](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/1Dzfz7huJ2X6MsFgqkswFG/2bdcf546000b28c2f391724433c6ebd5/free-trial-1)

[*source: [Auth0](https://auth0.com/lock)*]

In this spirit, any feature we support is covered with our in-depth [documentation](https://auth0.com/docs), and we offer guides to help developers really build their authentication process with whatever framework they use—not just plug-and-play solutions.

We’ve made available:

* Guides for integrating all of our features - [Lock](https://auth0.com/lock), [SSO](https://auth0.com/docs/sso/single-sign-on), [Rules](https://auth0.com/docs/rules), and more
* Plugins for popular platforms - [Wordpress](https://auth0.com/docs/cms#wordpress-plugin), [Joomla](https://auth0.com/docs/cms#joomla-extension), [SharePoint](https://github.com/auth0/auth0-sharepoint)
* Annotated back-end libraries for SDKs - [NodeJS](https://github.com/auth0/node-auth0), [Python](https://github.com/auth0/auth0-python), [PHP](https://github.com/auth0/auth0-php), [Ruby](https://github.com/auth0/ruby-auth0), and more
* Strategies for implementing Auth0 in different use cases - [Integrating Auth0 with various SaaS tools](https://auth0.com/blog/2016/04/07/integrate-auth0-into-your-existing-saas-tools/)
* Video walkthroughs - Step-by-step [Passwordless Authentication](https://auth0.com/video-tutorials/passwordless-authentication/passwordless-authentication) for new users
* Front-end framework integration examples -  Developing  with Auth0 in frameworks like [AngularJS](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuubsWkjwrM&list=PLZ14qQz3cfJIHeNmClIuqL3jpRDlJKVSd)

All of this is critical because you want customers to be as successful as possible using your product. As badly as you want it to be the case, customers will not always intuit how your product works, or more importantly, how it solves their problems. You have to show them, and content is the most powerful avenue you have for doing so.

Your product creates its own value, and your content helps your customers see it. The question is, how long should you give your customers to find it?

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Your product creates its own value, and your content helps your customers see it."/>

## Why The Right Trial Period Is The Shortest One

[41%](https://www.pierrelechelle.com/saas-free-trial) of SaaS companies offer 30 day free trials. The thinking typically goes that if you don’t give your customers enough time, their trial will run out before they see your product’s value, and they’ll leave thinking it was worthless. 30 days seems like a safe bet, in that light.

This is a terrible decision.

Your trial period should be the minimum amount of time needed for a customer to get value from your product. If it only takes a week to see your product’s value, that’s how long the trial should be. In fact, Steli Efti, founder of the sales CRM [Close.io](http://close.io/), says that [99% of SaaS companies](http://blog.close.io/saas-startups-why-your-free-trials-are-way-too-long) should offer a trial no longer than 14 days.

 For sales-supported SaaS companies (SaaS with a sales team), this is obvious. Shorter trials mean shorter sales cycles, freeing teams up to engage with more customers.

But what if you’re running a self-service model? [Price Intelligently](http://www.priceintelligently.com/), a price optimizing service for SaaS companies, points out that shortening your trial will still drive conversions by tapping into customers’ sense of [loss aversion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loss_aversion)—our tendency to fear loss more than we covet gain.

For example, [Kashflow](https://www.kashflow.com/) had a 60-day free trial period. By lowering it to 14 days, their conversion rate [increased by 25%](https://www.kashflow.com/blog/the-effect-of-shorter-trial-periods-for-saas/).  By Day 14, businesses were able to see the value the accounting software could create. By Day 60, they'd just been [taking it for granted](https://www.kashflow.com/blog/shorter-trial-periods/).

The exceptions to this are companies for whom value can only really be displayed over a longer period. Netflix, for example, is competing for your business with cable providers, which bill monthly. Netflix needs you to spend the whole month using their service so that when the time comes around for you to pay your cable bill, you feel like you’re wasting your money.

For some companies, it makes more sense to use a free trial and a free plan in tandem. For instance, at Auth0, we offer a [22 day trial](https://auth0.com/pricing) of our advanced plans, alongside a permanent free plan which hosts [7,000 users](https://auth0.com/blog/2015/11/05/announcing-our-new-pricing-including-a-production-ready-free-account/).

We want our customers to be familiar with the functionality our advanced plans provide, so that as their product grows, they’ll be able to identify when upgrading from the free plan makes the most sense for them.  

However, while your trial length should depend on your product, the most critical moments for customer engagement will always be the same.

## You Cannot Afford To Miss A Trial’s First or Final Minutes

There are two do-or-die moments where you must engage with your customer: when they start your trial, and when they finish it.

Reaching out immediately after a customer enrolls in a free trial simply has to be your first step. Customers who are engaged in the first 3 days of their trial are [4 times](https://www.chargify.com/blog/increase-free-trial-conversions/) as likely to convert later down the line. This is your chance to initiate a dialogue, personalizing the customer's experience with the product, and deepening their connection to it.

Obviously, doing this yourself is impossible at scale. Instead, you should use software like [Customer.io](https://customer.io/) in conjunction with [Auth0’s Rules](https://auth0.com/blog/2016/04/07/integrate-auth0-into-your-existing-saas-tools/) to automatically trigger targeted email campaigns to customers at [particular lifecycle events](https://customer.io/blog/smart-lifecycle-emails.html).

For example, [Auth0’s Segment Rule](https://auth0.com/blog/2015/09/11/7-ways-to-2x-your-revenue-growth-by-putting-your-user-data-to-work/) can track users’ activity and push that data to [Segment](https://segment.com/), a platform that collects customer data for other tools. By turning on the [Customer.io](http://customer.io/) integration in Segment, you can have your email campaigns instantly adapt to real-time data:

```js
function (user, context, callback) {
  if (context.protocol === 'delegation') {
    return callback(null, user, context);
  }

  const request = require('request');

  if (context.stats.loginsCount > 1) {
    sendEvent('Logged in');
  } else {
    sendEvent('Signed up');
  }

  function sendEvent(e) {
    const sioTrack = {
      userId: user.user_id,
      event: e,
      properties: {
        application: context.clientName
      },
      context: {
        ip: context.request.ip,
        userAgent: context.request.userAgent
      }
    };

    // Segment API returns 200 OK for all its request. For possible errors
    // you must use Segment's Debugger (https://segment.com/docs/libraries/http/#errors)
    request({
      method: 'POST',
      url: 'https://api.segment.io/v1/track',
      headers: {
        'Content-type' : 'application/json',
        'Authorization': 'Basic ' + Buffer.from(configuration.SEGMENTIO_WRITE_KEY + ':').toString('base64')
      },
      body: JSON.stringify(sioTrack),
    });
  }

  callback(null, user, context);
}
```

This means that when your users initially sign up, the Segment Rule will send their data to Customer.io, triggering a welcome email like this:

![growth free trial welcome email](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/1Dzfz7huJ2X6MsFgqkswFG/2bdcf546000b28c2f391724433c6ebd5/free-trial-1)

Similarly, at the end of their trial, you need to send them targeted conversion emails, building off the relationship you’ve built through prior correspondence to push them to convert.

It cannot be overstated how important it is to send conversion emails just as their trial ends. This is the last moment you have while they are still engaged with your product. The longer they're away from your product, the harder it will typically be to bring them back.

This gets back to Efti’s advice to shorten your trial periods. If you reach out to a customer either with a sales team or automated email, and they don’t seem likely to convert, you can offer to extend their trial by another 14 days. Roughly[ 30% ](http://blog.close.io/saas-startups-why-your-free-trials-are-way-too-long)of customers will take this extension, giving you the chance to really work out any pain points they’re experiencing.

## How A Good Free Trial Can Do More Than Drive Conversions

The formula here is simple:

* Your content guarantees that customers see your product’s value.
* Your trial length keeps customers from taking your product for granted.
* Your targeted communication nudges customers towards conversion.

Your desired outcome, in this situation, is conversions. You want customers to try your product, see its value, and become paying subscribers. However, each of these steps also presents secondary benefits.

Good content marketing can do more than improve a free trial, it can bring new customers in droves. Optimizing your trial’s length can keep you from wasting extra resources on customers who aren’t paying. And sending personalized, targeted emails can do more than convert free trial customers, it can prevent your paying customers from churning.

Not to mention, customers who try your free trial but won’t convert are still giving you usage data.

That’s not a bad silver lining.

[Unlock B2B SaaS growth with modern identity management. Download free eBook here.](https://resources.auth0.com/unlock-b2b-saas-growth-iam/)


Want Skyrocketing Growth? You Need To Offer a Free Trial

Use single sign-on, polish your listing, do internationalization, and deepen your integration to grow your app acquisition through marketplaces


In 5 short years, Pipedrive has grown from a small group of 5 co-founders to a global CRM software company with over [100 employees](http://blog.pipedrive.com/2015/09/5-years-100-people-and-lessons-learned/) and millions upon millions in annual revenue.

But like the rest of us, they started at 0.

When they launched in 2010, they had a product that their friends and family found useful, but they had no marketing plan. They reached out manually to people on Twitter to acquire one or two customers here and there, but they didn’t have any real sustainable and scalable way to get more.

What ultimately propelled them from 0 to 10,000 paying customers came as a total surprise. In 2011, when their growth exploded, a whopping 33% of new customers came directly from a totally unexpected source—the [Chrome Web Store](http://purde.net/2014/12/how-to-get-from-0-to-10000-paying-customers-in-saas/).

When you think [B2B SaaS customer acquisition](https://resources.auth0.com/unlock-b2b-saas-growth-iam/), you often think content marketing, advertising or direct sales. But it turns out that one of the cheapest, most powerful forms of customer acquisition are B2B app marketplaces.

## B2B App Marketplace Landscape

We’re all familiar with the Apple App Store and Google Play for consumer apps, but barely anyone seems to know about B2B app marketplaces like Chrome Web Store, Salesforce AppExchange, and Google Apps Marketplace.

Like on the consumer side, powerful platforms have emerged on the B2B side that give app developers access to millions of potential customers. That means the potential for massive, scalable growth where you’re getting customers nearly for free.

### Chrome web store

The Chrome Web Store contains every type of app imaginable, from B2B to games to Chrome browser themes. An app in the Chrome Web Store can mean as little as a bookmark to a website to what feels like a native app on the desktop.

The Chrome Web Store has grown in importance—especially for business—due to the incredible and continuing success of the Chrome browser and the Chromebook laptop.

1. Google Chrome the web browser is dominating with consumers—with a 25%+ market share and growing fast—and it’s also surpassing Microsoft Internet Explorer among businesses, too. According to Gartner, by 2016, [66% of enterprise users](http://www.computerworld.com/article/2932672/web-browsers/ie-loses-stranglehold-on-the-enterprise-as-chrome-makes-major-inroads.html) will be running Chrome.
2. Chromebooks are the fastest growing B2B laptop segment with [43% growth](http://www.zdnet.com/article/npd-chromebooks-outsell-windows-laptops/) during the first half of 2015. Chromebooks are laptops that only run the Chrome browser, so the only apps available to Chromebook users come from the Chrome Store.

Finally, Chrome is included as the default browser on all Android devices, and Android is taking market share away from iOS in the enterprise. That boosts the Chrome ecosystem for those who want a consistent experience across all their devices.

All of that adds up to massive opportunity for B2B SaaS developers to reach business customers via the Chrome Web Store.

### Salesforce AppExchange

Salesforce founder and CEO Marc Benioff first coined and trademarked the term “App Store,” before [gifting it to Steve Jobs](http://appleinsider.com/articles/11/08/26/salesforce_chief_gave_steve_jobs_app_store_trademark_as_token_of_appreciation) as a thank you for Jobs’s years of personal support. The AppExchange has been around since 2006 and it’s the earliest B2B cloud app marketplace.

The AppExchange doesn’t consist of only sales-related apps, although that’s its expertise. Just as Salesforce has expanded beyond pure CRM, so has the AppExchange, with apps ranging from project management to customer service to HR and more.

[71% of Salesforce](https://medium.com/@salesforce/power-of-the-platform-salesforce-appexchange-hits-3-million-installs-5168928ce94e) customers use apps, and app usage is growing: it took 6 years to get 1 million app installs, 2 years to break 2 million, and just 18 months to get to 3 million. What’s amazing about this number is that a single app install means that the app potentially gets deployed to hundreds or even thousands of employees inside of the company.

Entire businesses have been built on top of Salesforce using the AppExchange for distribution. ServiceMax, which just raised another $82 million in funding—helps companies service and maintain the equipment—and it has grown a huge business focused entirely on its partnership with Salesforce.

### Google Apps Marketplace

Like with AppExchange, the power of the Google Apps Marketplace is that a single install there can mean that the app is deployed to every person in the entire organization.

Google Apps is a suite of productivity tools that you need for work. It features email but it also includes online storage, calendars, collaboration, and more. Because Google Apps is based around email—which everyone in the company needs—it can easily become the central place in your company where you manage each employee’s identity and their access to the different tools they use.

That makes the Apps Marketplace the obvious place to install and deploy apps to the organization. According to a recent study, [33% of Google Apps administrators](http://www.appneta.com/blog/the-market-is-migrating-to-google-apps/) said that the existence of an app within the Google Apps Marketplace helped encourage its adoption by the whole business.

Among small businesses, the Google Apps suite of tools is #1 and owns [22.8% of the market](http://www.winbeta.org/news/office-365-overtakes-google-apps-in-business-market-triples-share-in-a-year). That makes the Apps Marketplace a really attractive place to acquire business customers.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Among small businesses, the Google Apps suite of tools is #1 and owns 22.8% of the market"/>

### And More

There are numerous other places where apps connect their customers to third party developers. These range from formal-style app stores with ratings, reviews and transactions—like the Shopify App Store—to a more informal listing of integrations—like the Yammer App Directory.

* [Microsoft Office Store](https://store.office.com/)
* [Shopify App Store](https://apps.shopify.com/)
* [Box App Store](https://app.box.com/apps/)
* [Yammer App Directory](https://developer.yammer.com/docs/yammer-partners)
* [Evernote App Center](https://appcenter.evernote.com/)

These smaller app stores usually focus around the specialty of the provider. If you’re building for e-commerce, you’re going to want to get into the Shopify App Store, and you probably won’t be interested in the Box App Store.

Don’t overlook them, though. These platforms are still huge and they can have a big impact of your business. If you narrow in and really nail the use case, you can rise to the top of the app store and thrive. For example, e-commerce receipt SaaS service [Receiptful](http://receiptful.com/) has grown from nothing to sending over 500,000+ receipts every month with the [Shopify App Store](https://apps.shopify.com/receiptful) as its primary source of customer acquisition.

## How to Succeed in the App Store

First, you just need to get into these B2B app stores. Then, you need to experiment to get your app discovered and find success.

The requirements of getting into an app store can range widely.

For example, Chrome apps take 3 forms:

1. Hosted Apps: a hosted app is a wrapper for a website  that can be as basic as just a bookmark.
2. Packaged Apps: a packaged app feels like a native desktop app.
3. Extensions: an extension extends the functionality of Chrome and the websites being viewed in it.

With the most basic hosted app, you only need to create a manifest, add a few images, write your ad copy, and you’ll have a listing in the Chrome Store in less than 30 minutes. On the other end of the spectrum, creating a packaged app or an extension can take months.

Each app store has a different set of requirements and approaches to finding success, but they can be abstracted into the following principles.

### Get into the app store with single sign-on

Often, the most basic requirement to get into the app store is to have single sign-on for the app store provider.

* It makes account management easy for the customer so that your app doesn't feel like yet another tool that has its own separate login credentials.
* It provides continuity between app experiences by authorizing access to user information to can be used to tailor the app experience.

For example, having Google login a pre-requisite to getting into the Google Apps Marketplace.

Even if, as with the Chrome Store, you aren’t required to integrate with Google login, putting up a listing without it available can be a recipe for negative reviews.

![Bad Chrome Comment](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/56lUgBRnqSWwTzLSOMZolI/1b5afe376579b1f77674c3d9908ffa95/chrome-rating)

Single sign-on is the most basic integration possible, and it becomes something that users expect. If it’s not available, users will potentially revolt and tank your listing’s rating.

Setting the login up for one provider can be a huge pain—much less doing it for multiple ones—as you’ll have to deal with the peculiarities of the company’s login API and grapple with its documentation.

With <a href="https://auth0.com/signup" data-amp-replace="CLIENT_ID" data-amp-addparams="anonId=CLIENT_ID(cid-scope-cookie-fallback-name)">Auth0</a>, all you need to do is flip a switch to activate a number of integrations.

![Auth0 Social connections](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/1scqOByj04c3rmHQh1OwUI/48254e4f7418eac5ac9b006d1e3859fa/auth0-social)

### Polish your listing

Your app store listing consists of a few main components. Optimize these, and you’ll dramatically improve your chances of having your app discovered among the vast number of apps in the app store.

* Text
* Images and Video
* Ratings and Reviews
* Download Count

**Text**: You want to think of this the same way you think about SEO: What keywords do I want to rank for and how do I optimize for those keywords?

Put your most important keywords in your listing’s title and make sure they appear with some frequency in your listing body. However, don’t over-stuff your keywords as it will look spammy and lower your conversion rate from view to download as a result.

**Images and Video**: Don’t just include any images in any order—tell a story with your images. This is incredibly important because most people won’t read the text of your product description, so they rely on the images and screenshots to understand your product.

Wherever possible, use video, because it’s even more powerful than images in conveying what the product is for and the emotion behind your brand.

For your images, put your main screen that captures what your product does as your first image. Then, include the following images in a narrative order with short copy on each that explains the screen. This will help get your product from a view to a download.

**Ratings and Reviews**: A high rating and a good volume of positive reviews will increase your search ranking and make it more likely that will people download upon discovery.

Seed a solid score with ratings and reviews from your most loyal customers, your team, and your friends and family. That will  secure you decent initial placement and your first few downloads.

![Review screen](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/1z9421reCAHo11xn9rngLW/b3fd77cf2f33b438292db6ff5a20fb7f/profile)

Create a positive feedback loop for continual ranking improvement by doing the following:

1. Segment your users by identity provider or referrer. You want to pull those customers who found your app via the relevant app store.
2. Create a sub-segment of those users who are likely to give your app a favorable review by looking to see if they’re active with the app. For example, you could pull those users whose latest login was fewer than 3 days ago.
3. Send those users an email asking them to review you in the app store. You can do this by hand early on. Use [Auth0 with Customer.io](https://auth0.com/blog/2015/09/11/7-ways-to-2x-your-revenue-growth-by-putting-your-user-data-to-work/)  to make this a systematic email that goes out once you’ve seen that this process works.

**Download Count**: The more downloads your app has, the more it will get. This is the factor of app store discovery that you have the least control over. However, if you iterate on the principles outlined above, you could find yourself with ever-increasing download numbers, and that means even more downloads.

### Grow through internationalization

App stores are typically region-specific. You’re able to adapt your listing to fit the local language which makes it easier for customers to buy.

The Chrome Store for Brazil, for instance, is in Portuguese, while the Chrome Store for France is in French. If your app is English-only, your app will appear in the Brazilian Chrome Store, but you’ll get outranked by apps that have been localized for Brazil.

![Internationalize your app](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/44tGV5IPAOQMP7ySE9yjMD/ececb5e5ebfe5b79eba4f81a8c418c77/chrome-store)

The upshot is that if Chrome Store is working for you, you have a great opportunity to drive growth by internationalizing the app.

Pipedrive, for instance, “[translated the app](http://purde.net/2014/12/how-to-get-from-0-to-10000-paying-customers-in-saas/) and website to Spanish, German, Russian, Brazilian Portuguese, French and Estonian pretty early on.” They ended up seeing huge growth from the Chrome Store in Brazil, due to having a localized listing and getting mentioned in a prominent Brazilian blog.

### Deepen your integration

Start your integration with the app store provider by connecting single sign-on. Then, progressively make your integration deeper and deeper. Deep integration gives you two benefits:

1. Happier customers who are getting more value out of your product via improved workflows and better UX, and
2. The opportunity to get spotlighted in as a featured app.

App stores want to showcase apps that make the most of the platform they offer, and the difference between being above the fold and featured on the front page, and being beneath the fold and only accessible by browsing or by search is absolutely massive.

![Deeper integration in Chrome WebStore](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/2iUQy7a9DfByRkjF82FBAN/eb97db7727c362c6d6036c7d6b2fd112/chrome-web-store)

When Google Drive launched, they looked for partner apps to showcase what you could do by integrating with Google Drive. [HelloFax](http://hellofax.com/)—an online fax tool—teamed up with them and built a Google Drive integration that made it easier to access and fax Google Docs. That got them [featured by the Chrome Store](http://blog.hellofax.com/uncategorized/nice-spot-in-the-chrome-web-store/) and they scored [50,000+ new customers](http://techcrunch.com/2012/05/10/hellofax-with-51k-installs-were-king-of-google-drive-apps/) in two weeks.

## Acquire Customers and Improve Your Product at the Same Time

Often, the hardest part of starting a company isn’t building product or innovating on technology—it’s acquiring customers. Building sales and marketing teams is particularly tough for engineering-focused founders.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Often, the hardest part of starting a company isn’t building product—it’s acquiring customers."/>

What’s most awesome about acquiring customers via apps marketplaces is that it turns the process of customer acquisition into a process of improving the product. As you add single sign-on and deeper integrations, you add and deepen your product’s functionality as the same time as you improve your product’s app store acquisition.

A few years in, the importance of the Chrome Store for Pipedrive’s business had dramatically decreased. Yet, those tailwinds provided by the free, frictionless customer acquisition via Chrome Store helped them build the rare, absolutely critical momentum that startups need to succeed in a big way.

They were able to focus 100% of their energy on improving the product, which got them from 0 to 10,000 customers and now has put them in a position to challenge the giants of CRM.

[Unlock B2B SaaS growth with modern identity management. Download free eBook here.](https://resources.auth0.com/unlock-b2b-saas-growth-iam/)


"acquisition"