Behind the Cloud: The Untold Story of How Salesforce.com Went from Idea to Billion-Dollar Company-and Revolutionized an Industry

by Marc Benioff

In thinking like a start-up, abide by these three rules to help save infrastructure costs: 1. Translate the product on day one to the major languages, but only add additional languages as customer demand builds. (In Europe we’ve found merit to the “80-20 rule,” whereby 80 percent of the revenue comes from 20 percent of the languages spoken in the region. Although we considered starting operations all over, we boiled it down to the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Spain, and the Nordic countries—and kept our focus there.) 2. Build a bedrock of small customers in each country before hiring local employees. This proves that the market is ready and the commitment is worth it. 3. Don’t overhire. Employment laws overseas are complicated and largely favor the employee. When hiring sales and customer service people, adhere to the same standards that you would in the home office.