Marc Benioff is the co-founder and CEO of Salesforce, the second-largest software company in the world. He started programming at age 15, selling his first program for $75, and went on to build Salesforce into a company worth more than $300 billion that also owns Slack, Tableau, Quip, and MuleSoft. Marc is known as a marketing legend, and is now leading Salesforce into the era of AI agents. In our conversation, we discuss:
• The importance of maintaining a beginner’s mind
• His approach to product launches and marketing
• Managing through tough times and layoffs
• His relationship with Steve Jobs and lessons learned
• Why Salesforce is betting big on AI agents
• Many stories from his entrepreneurial roller coaster
• Much more
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• Cloudinary—The foundational technology for all images and video on the internet
• Enterpret—Transform customer feedback into product growth
• Coda—The all-in-one collaborative workspace
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Find the transcript at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/behind-the-founder-marc-benioff
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Where to find Marc Benioff:
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcbenioff
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Where to find Lenny:
• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com
• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/
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In this episode, we cover:
(00:00) Introduction to Marc Benioff and Salesforce
(03:54) Marc’s early career and domain names
(05:59) The App Store story and lessons from Steve Jobs
(15:18) Lessons from launching Salesforce
(22:03) The importance of keeping a beginner’s mindset
(29:53) Why Marc calls Salesforce the “25-year startup”
(31:47) Agentforce
(36:09) Why Marc says AI is the defining technology of our lifetime
(40:12) AI’s impact on the workforce
(42:31) Entrepreneurs need to be like conductors
(46:02) Failure corner
(50:32) The future of AI agents
(56:34) Final thoughts and farewell
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Referenced:
• Bill.com: https://www.bill.com
• App Store: https://www.apple.com/app-store/
• Salesforce: https://www.salesforce.com
• Oracle: https://www.oracle.com
• Larry Ellison on X: https://x.com/larryellison
• Siebel Systems: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siebel_Systems
• Saba Software: https://talentedlearning.com/lms-vendor-directory/saba-software
• Tom Siebel on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomassiebel
• Avon: https://www.avon.com
• Salesforce Chief Has Pul
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