SaaStr's Agentforce Results (1-Month In): What SMB Sales Teams Can Learn

Salesforce Agentforce just passed its first real-world test. SaaStr, one of B2B SaaS's most influential communities, deployed Agentforce one month ago at Dreamforce 2024 to resurrect 1,000 leads their sales team had already given up on. The results? 72% email open rate, highest response rate across all their platforms, and revenue ranging from $600 to $60,000 per conversion—from leads that were generating exactly zero dollars before.

For SMB sales teams (10-50 reps) watching the Agentic AI wave, this is the first credible proof point that AI agents can drive actual revenue, not just demos. But there's a catch: SaaStr had Salesforce's Field Development Engineer help them set it up, they're deliberately keeping it capped while they learn, and they had a unique advantage—years of context already living in Salesforce.

What does this mean for small teams without Salesforce's white-glove treatment or enterprise budgets? Let's break down the real costs, capabilities, and whether you should adopt now or wait.

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Executive Summary

SaaStr's 1-month Agentforce pilot reveals both the promise and complexity of Agentic AI for B2B sales teams. Key findings from their deployment and Salesforce's 2025 pricing updates:

• SaaStr's Results: 72% open rate on 3,000 emails/month to 1,000 previously ghosted leads, with highest response rate of all their platforms. Revenue per conversion: $600-$60,000 (vs. $0 before)
• Success Factor: Agentforce pulled from years of past interactions stored in Salesforce—context was "the magic" that made AI emails feel personal, not robotic
• Pricing Reality for SMBs: Salesforce offers 3 models—$0.10/action (Flex Credits), $2/conversation, or $125-$550/user/month. A 10-person team running SaaStr's volume (300 emails/person/month = 3,000 actions) would pay $300/month minimum (Flex) or $1,250-$5,500/month (user licenses)
• Setup Complexity: SaaStr needed Salesforce FDE assistance and is "deliberately keeping it capped while they learn"—not a plug-and-play solution for most SMBs
• SMB Alternative Path: For teams under 50 reps without Salesforce or needing simpler setup, AI-native CRMs like Optifai ($58/month flat, unlimited AI actions) offer autonomous email follow-up without enterprise implementation burden
• Adoption Timing: If you already use Salesforce Sales Cloud and have $1K-5K/month budget, pilot Agentforce now with Flex Credits. If not, wait 6-12 months for SMB-focused AI agent platforms to mature—or adopt AI-native CRM today

Key Takeaway: Agentforce proved AI agents can resurrect dead leads at scale, but SMB teams need realistic expectations about setup effort and total cost. The "ghosted lead resurrection" playbook works—the question is whether to build it on Salesforce's enterprise stack or an SMB-optimized platform.

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Table of Contents

• The News: SaaStr's 1-Month Agentforce Results
• What Is Salesforce Agentforce?
• The Data: 72% Open Rate on Dead Leads
• Why It Worked: Context is the Magic
• Agentforce Pricing: 3 Models Explained
• What This Means for SMB Teams
• Comparison: Agentforce vs. AI-Native CRM
• Should You Adopt Agentforce Now?
• Expert Take: Our Analysis
• FAQ

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The News: SaaStr's 1-Month Agentforce Results

When: November 2025 (deployment at Dreamforce, ~1 month ago) Who: SaaStr, the B2B SaaS community with 100,000+ members and annual conference attendance of 13,000+ What: Deployed Salesforce Agentforce to re-engage 1,000 leads their sales team had ghosted Source: SaaStr Blog Post

SaaStr's experiment addressed a universal B2B problem: what to do with leads that went cold after initial contact. Their sales team had explicitly decided not to follow up with these 1,000 people—effectively writing off potential revenue.

Instead of manual outreach (which wasn't happening) or generic email blasts (which get ignored), they used Agentforce to:

1. Pull historical context from years of past interactions stored in Salesforce
2. Generate personalized emails based on each lead's engagement history with SaaStr
3. Automate follow-up sequences without manual intervention
4. Track results natively in Salesforce (no separate tool to manage)

The results came fast: within the first month, they're seeing email performance that beats all other platforms they use, and revenue is flowing from leads that were generating zero dollars.

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What Is Salesforce Agentforce?

Salesforce Agentforce (announced in September 2024, GA in October 2024) represents Salesforce's shift from AI Copilots (tools that suggest actions) to AI Agents (tools that autonomously execute workflows).

Key Capabilities

Autonomous Email Outreach:

• Reads past interactions from Salesforce records
• Generates personalized emails based on context (no templates)
• Sends follow-ups automatically based on response behavior
• Learns from what gets replies vs. ignored

Native Salesforce Integration:

• Pulls data from Accounts, Contacts, Opportunities, Cases
• Updates records after each interaction
• Works inside existing Sales Cloud workflows (no new platform to learn)

Action-Based vs. Conversation-Based:

• Each "action" = update record, send email, summarize case, execute prompt/flow
• Agents make decisions autonomously (vs. copilots that wait for human approval)

How It Differs from Traditional Sales Automation

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The Data: 72% Open Rate on Dead Leads

SaaStr shared specific metrics from their first month:

Email Performance

Volume: Working through initial 1,000-person list, sending roughly 3,000 emails/month (3 emails/person average with follow-ups)

Open Rate: 72%—dramatically higher than:

• Industry average cold email: 15-25%
• Industry average warm email: 30-45%
• SaaStr's other platforms: Not disclosed, but Agentforce has "highest response rate"

Response Rate: SaaStr didn't disclose exact %, but stated it's the "highest response rate of all their platforms" (which includes traditional email campaigns, LinkedIn outreach, etc.)

Revenue Impact

Before Agentforce: $0 (sales team had decided not to follow up with these leads)

After Agentforce: Revenue per conversion ranges from:

• $600 (event ticket purchase)
• $60,000 (Gold Sponsor package)

Quote from SaaStr: "Either way is a lot more than zero"—highlighting that even low-value conversions are pure incremental revenue from leads that were abandoned.

What We Don't Know (Yet)

SaaStr deliberately kept some metrics private, likely because:

• It's only been 1 month (too early for full funnel analysis)
• They're "keeping it capped while they learn" (not full-scale deployment)
• Competitive reasons (they're in the B2B SaaS education/events business)

Missing data points:

• Exact response rate %
• Conversion rate (responses → revenue)
• Average deal size
• Time to conversion
• Cost per acquisition

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Why It Worked: Context is the Magic

SaaStr's success wasn't just about AI email writing—it was about years of context stored in Salesforce.

The Context Advantage

This is the critical difference between AI email tools (like Jasper, Copy.ai) and AI agents (like Agentforce):

AI Email Tools:

• You provide: Name, company, role, maybe industry
• AI generates: Generic email with those details filled in
• Result: Sounds like AI, gets ignored

AI Agents with Context:

• AI reads: 3 years of email threads, webinar attendance, past purchases, support tickets
• AI generates: Email referencing specific past interactions ("We noticed you attended our 2023 ARR workshop...")
• Result: Feels like a human who remembers the relationship

What Context Agentforce Can Pull

If you're using Salesforce, Agentforce can access:

• Email History: All past emails (sent/received) via Salesforce Email Integration
• Activity Timeline: Meetings, calls, webinar attendance
• Opportunity History: Deals that closed, deals that stalled, objections raised
• Case History: Support tickets, product issues, feature requests
• Account Notes: Sales rep notes, call summaries, competitive intel
• Engagement Scoring: Which content they clicked, which emails they opened

This is why SaaStr's Agentforce emails didn't feel like AI—the agent had the same context a human SDR would have after reading 3 years of CRM history.

The SMB Context Problem

Here's the challenge for small teams: Do you have that context in your CRM?

Most SMBs struggle with:

• Incomplete CRM data (reps don't log every interaction)
• Scattered tools (emails in Gmail, meetings in Calendly, notes in Notion)
• Short history (company founded 2 years ago, CRM implemented 6 months ago)

If your CRM is thin on context, AI agents won't magically perform better—they'll just generate generic emails faster.

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Agentforce Pricing: 3 Models Explained

Salesforce offers 3 pricing models for Agentforce (updated May 2025). This complexity is both a strength (flexibility) and weakness (hard to predict costs).

Model 1: Flex Credits (Pay-per-Action)

How it works: Each action costs 20 Flex Credits (equivalent to $0.10 per action)

What counts as an "action":

• Send one email
• Update one Salesforce record
• Summarize one case
• Execute one prompt or flow

Pricing:

• Buy in packs of 100,000 credits = $500
• No monthly commitment (pay as you go)
• Credits don't expire

Example cost for SaaStr's volume:

• 3,000 emails/month = 3,000 actions
• Cost: 3,000 × $0.10 = $300/month

Best for:

• Pilots and testing (SaaStr is likely using this)
• Unpredictable workloads
• Teams that want to control spend

Model 2: Conversation-Based Pricing

How it works: $2 per conversation (a conversation = multi-turn interaction, like email thread or chat session)

What counts as a "conversation":

• Email thread with multiple back-and-forth replies
• Customer service chat session
• Not well-defined for outbound sales use case

Why it's problematic for SMBs:

• Hard to predict costs (is a 3-email sequence 1 conversation or 3?)
• Can get expensive fast for high-volume outreach
• Originally designed for customer service, not sales

Salesforce faced backlash on this model for being "pricey and unpredictable for SMBs," leading to the Flex Credits alternative.

Model 3: User Licenses (Monthly Subscription)

Agentforce Add-Ons (for existing Sales Cloud customers):

• Standard: $125/user/month (Sales, Service, Field Service)
• Premium: $150/user/month (Financial Services, Health, Manufacturing clouds)
• Includes: Unlimited employee-facing agent usage inside Salesforce

Agentforce 1 Editions (standalone):

• $550/user/month (most comprehensive AI suite)
• Includes: Einstein Copilot, Slack AI, Data Cloud, Tableau Pulse, Agentforce

Example cost for 10-person SMB team:

• Standard add-on: $125 × 10 = $1,250/month
• Agentforce 1: $550 × 10 = $5,500/month

Best for:

• Large teams with predictable usage
• Companies that need all-you-can-eat pricing
• Enterprises with budget for per-seat licenses

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What This Means for SMB Teams

Let's translate SaaStr's results into implications for a typical 10-person SMB sales team:

Cost Reality Check

If you want to replicate SaaStr's approach (300 emails/person/month = 3,000 total):

Option A: Flex Credits

• 3,000 actions/month × $0.10 = $300/month
• Total first-year cost: $3,600 + Salesforce Sales Cloud ($125/user × 10 = $1,250/month = $15,000/year) = $18,600/year

Option B: User Licenses (Standard Add-On)

• $125/user × 10 = $1,250/month = $15,000/year
• Plus Sales Cloud: $1,250/month = $15,000/year
• Total first-year cost: $30,000/year

Option C: Agentforce 1 (All-Inclusive)

• $550/user × 10 = $5,500/month = $66,000/year
• Includes Sales Cloud (no additional cost)

The Hidden Costs

1. Setup Effort: SaaStr explicitly mentioned they needed Salesforce FDE (Field Development Engineer) help. For SMBs:

• No access to FDE unless you're a large account
• Need to hire Salesforce consultant ($150-250/hour, estimate 20-40 hours = $3K-10K)
• Or DIY with online resources (estimate 40-80 hours of internal time)

2. Data Cleanup: Agentforce is only as good as your CRM data. Before deploying:

• Dedupe contacts (merge duplicates)
• Standardize fields (company names, industries)
• Complete missing data (emails, roles, engagement history)
• Estimate: 2-4 weeks for 10-person team's CRM

3. Learning Curve: SaaStr is "deliberately keeping it capped while they learn." Why?

• AI agents can make mistakes (wrong email tone, incorrect assumptions)
• Need to monitor output quality (at least first 100 emails)
• Iterative tuning (adjust prompts, exclude certain contact types)

When It Makes Sense for SMBs

✅ Good fit if you:

• Already use Salesforce Sales Cloud (sunk cost)
• Have clean CRM data with years of interaction history
• Can afford $300-1,250/month extra (Flex or Standard add-on)
• Have technical team member who can learn Agentforce setup
• Want to resurrect 500-1,000+ ghosted leads (like SaaStr)

❌ Not a fit if you:

• Don't use Salesforce (total cost too high: $1,250 + $300-1,250 = $1,550-2,500/month)
• CRM data is thin or messy (AI won't have context to work with)
• Budget is <$1,000/month for all sales tools
• No technical resources for setup/monitoring

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Comparison: Agentforce vs. AI-Native CRM

For SMB teams not already locked into Salesforce, there's an alternative path: AI-native CRMs built from the ground up for autonomous sales workflows.

Key Differences

Salesforce Agentforce:

• Strength: Deep integration with Salesforce ecosystem (if you already use it)
• Strength: Can pull from years of enterprise-grade CRM history
• Weakness: High total cost ($18K-66K/year for 10-person team)
• Weakness: Complex setup (SaaStr needed FDE support)

AI-Native CRM (e.g., Optifai):

• Strength: Built for autonomous workflows (not bolted onto legacy CRM)
• Strength: Flat pricing ($58/user, unlimited AI actions)
• Strength: Fast setup (AI auto-configures based on your business)
• Weakness: Less mature ecosystem than Salesforce (fewer integrations)
• Weakness: Newer platform (less enterprise adoption proof)

Decision Framework

Choose Salesforce Agentforce if:

• You already pay $1,250/month for Sales Cloud
• You have 3+ years of clean CRM data
• You need deep Salesforce integrations (CPQ, Marketing Cloud, etc.)
• Budget is not primary constraint

Choose AI-Native CRM if:

• Starting fresh or migrating from spreadsheets/lightweight CRM
• Budget is $500-1,000/month for all sales tools
• Want autonomous workflows without setup complexity
• Prefer predictable flat pricing vs. per-action costs

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Should You Adopt Agentforce Now?

Based on SaaStr's results and Salesforce's 2025 pricing, here's our recommendation framework:

✅ Adopt Agentforce Now If:

1. You're Already a Salesforce Customer

• Using Sales Cloud (not just free trial)
• Have clean CRM data with 2+ years of history
• Budget allows $300-1,250/month extra (Flex or Standard add-on)
• Action: Start with Flex Credits ($500 minimum), pilot on 100-500 ghosted leads

2. You Have a Specific High-Value Use Case

• 500-1,000+ ghosted leads worth $500-50K each (like SaaStr)
• Account-based sales where context matters (enterprise deals)
• Renewal outreach to churned customers
• Action: Calculate ROI—if 1-2 conversions pay for annual cost, pilot immediately

3. You Have Technical Resources

• In-house Salesforce admin or consultant relationship
• Can dedicate 20-40 hours to setup and monitoring
• Comfortable iterating on AI prompt engineering
• Action: Budget $3K-5K for consultant help if no in-house expertise

⏸️ Wait 6-12 Months If:

1. You're Not on Salesforce

• Total cost ($1,550-2,500/month) is 2-3× your current sales tool budget
• Migration effort (move to Salesforce + clean data) takes 3-6 months
• Alternative: Pilot AI-native CRM (Optifai, Attio) for faster ROI

2. Your CRM Data is Messy

• Missing emails, duplicates, incomplete interaction history
• Sales reps don't consistently log activities
• Action: Spend next 2-4 months cleaning data, then reassess

3. Budget is <$1,000/Month

• Even Flex Credits model requires Salesforce base ($1,250/month)
• Alternative: Use simpler AI email tools (Lavender, Instantly.ai) for $50-200/month

🚀 Adopt AI-Native CRM Instead If:

1. You Want Autonomous Workflows Today

• Not locked into Salesforce ecosystem
• Need predictable pricing ($58/user vs. variable per-action)
• Want 5-minute setup vs. weeks of configuration
• Action: Start free trial of Optifai, migrate 10-20 key accounts to test

2. You're a Growing Startup

• 5-20 person team, revenue $500K-5M ARR
• Need to scale sales without hiring more SDRs
• Want AI to handle ghosted lead follow-up automatically
• Action: Implement AI CRM now, migrate to Salesforce later if needed at enterprise scale

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Expert Take: Our Analysis

SaaStr's Agentforce results are the first credible proof that Agentic AI works for B2B sales—but with critical caveats for SMB teams.

What's Real

1. 72% Open Rate is Legitimate This isn't a fluke. When AI agents have deep context (SaaStr's years of Salesforce history), they generate emails that feel personal because they are personal—the AI read the same history a human would.

2. Dead Lead Resurrection Works The "ghosted leads → revenue" playbook is repeatable. Most B2B companies have 500-5,000 leads that went cold after initial contact. AI agents can systematically re-engage them without burning human hours.

3. Context is Non-Negotiable Generic AI emails (generated without historical context) get 15-25% open rates—same as human-written cold emails. The magic is in pulling 2-3 years of interaction data, which Salesforce uniquely enables if you've been diligent about CRM hygiene.

What's Overhyped

1. "Plug and Play" Narrative SaaStr explicitly needed Salesforce FDE help and is "keeping it capped while they learn." This is not a one-click deploy. Budget 20-40 hours of setup + 10 hours/month monitoring for first 3 months.

2. Pricing Transparency Salesforce's 3 pricing models (Flex, Conversation, User License) create confusion. Most SMBs will gravitate to Flex Credits ($0.10/action) thinking it's cheap, then realize they need Sales Cloud base ($1,250/month) on top of it.

3. "AI Replaces SDRs" Claims Agentforce handles one workflow (email follow-up to existing leads). It doesn't:

• Generate new leads from scratch
• Handle inbound calls or live chat
• Negotiate pricing or close deals
• Build relationships that require phone calls

Realistic expectation: AI agents handle 30-40% of SDR workload (follow-up, re-engagement), freeing humans for high-value tasks (discovery calls, demos).

Our Recommendation

For Existing Salesforce Customers: SaaStr's results justify piloting Agentforce if you have clean data and budget. Start with Flex Credits ($300-500/month), target 100-500 ghosted leads, and measure open rate + revenue after 30 days. If you hit 60%+ open rate, scale to full list.

For SMBs Not on Salesforce: Total cost ($18K-66K/year for 10-person team) is too high unless you're enterprise-bound. Better path: Adopt AI-native CRM (Optifai at $580/month for 10 users) to get autonomous workflows today at 1/3 the cost, then evaluate Salesforce at $5M+ ARR when you need enterprise features.

For Early-Stage Startups: Don't adopt Agentforce yet. Your CRM data is <1 year old (insufficient context for AI), and you're still figuring out ICP/messaging. Use simple AI email tools (Lavender, Instantly.ai) for $50-200/month until you have 500+ qualified leads to resurrect.

The Bigger Trend

SaaStr's experiment validates that 2025 is the year Agentic AI moves from demos to production in B2B sales. But the "winners" will be:

• Enterprises with Salesforce + clean data (Agentforce path)
• SMBs adopting AI-native CRMs built for autonomy (Optifai, Attio path)

The "losers" will be teams stuck in the middle—using legacy CRM (HubSpot, Pipedrive) without AI agent capabilities, trying to cobble together AI email tools, Zapier workflows, and manual processes.

Bottom line: SaaStr proved the playbook works. The question is which platform you'll run it on.

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FAQ

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Next Steps: Your Agentforce Decision

Based on your situation, here's what to do this week:

If You're Already a Salesforce Customer

1. Check your data quality (15 minutes):
   • Run Salesforce report: % of Contacts with Email + Last Activity Date
   • Target: >80% complete for pilot to work
2. Calculate your ghosted lead list (30 minutes):
   • Contacts with Last Activity >90 days ago, no Open Opportunity
   • Target: 100-500 leads for pilot
3. Budget review (10 minutes):
   • Flex Credits: $0.10/action × estimated monthly emails
   • vs. Standard Add-On: $125/user × # of users who'd use Agentforce
4. Request Agentforce demo from Salesforce AE (mention SaaStr case study)

If You're Not on Salesforce

1. Evaluate total cost (10 minutes):
   • Salesforce Sales Cloud: $125/user × team size
   • Plus Agentforce: $125-550/user or $0.10/action
   • Compare to: AI-native CRM ($58/user flat, unlimited AI actions)
2. Decision framework:
   • If budget >$2,000/month + need enterprise features → Pilot Salesforce
   • If budget <$1,000/month + need autonomous workflows → Try AI-native CRM (Optifai free trial)
3. Try alternatives first:
   • Optifai - AI-native CRM with autonomous email follow-up ($58/user)
   • Test ghosted lead resurrection without Salesforce commitment

Everyone: Learn from SaaStr's Playbook

The "ghosted lead resurrection" workflow is repeatable, regardless of platform:

1. Identify ghosted leads: Last contact >60-90 days ago, no current opportunity
2. Ensure context exists: Minimum 2-3 past interactions (emails, calls, meetings)
3. Start small: Pilot 100-200 leads, measure open rate + response rate after 30 days
4. Iterate on messaging: Review first 50 AI-generated emails, adjust tone/length
5. Scale if proven: If open rate >50% + positive responses, expand to full list

The key insight from SaaStr: AI agents work when they have context. Build that context (via clean CRM data or AI enrichment), and the results follow.

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About the Author: Emily Kim is a B2B sales technology analyst and contributor to Revenue Velocity Lab, helping SMB teams adopt AI without enterprise budgets.

Last Updated: November 18, 2025

Sources:

• SaaStr Blog Post
• Salesforce Agentforce Pricing
• Salesforce 2025 Pricing Update