True Sales Results

Just finished building a new Teaching Convo Sales deck for an Enterprise Cybersecurity client. I'm super proud to say that it is an absolutely kick ass piece of work! We will arm my client's sellers with a compelling, distinctly differentiated story that will wake up Enterprise CISOs all over the world. Cloud, AI, PQC, and Confidential Compute all converging and creating the perfect storm for global Enterprise Companies. We will crush the Cybersecurity sales competition that are telling the same old tired stories that all sound alike. Putting CISOs to sleep worldwide. #AI #PQC #ConfidentialCompute #Cloud #cybersecurity #saas #salesoptimization

Let's not over react to DeepSeek's claims about their AI LLM. Chinese Technology companies are not known for being truthful. And perhaps they should have invested more in Cybersecurity. #AI #Cybersecurity #DeepSeek

What if you knew what the "winning hand" was in your sales pursuits? The Game of Poker and Sales are analogous in that they are a competition largely based on the probability or odds of winning. What if you knew that your competitor had a Champion or Aces in the Hole in the opportunity that you didn't? What do great poker players and great sales teams have in common? They constantly obsess over qualifying their odds of winning as the deal unfolds in Texas Hold'em or as the deal unfold in a SaaS product evaluation. They ask the tough questions early and often. Has anything changed since we last spoke that would impact this project? How well do we match up against the customer's decision criteria compared to the competition? How well aligned is the prospective customer to our Ideal Customer Profile (ICP)? What objections does the customer have and can we overcome them? Are there any Blockers in this account and can we neutralize them? What will be required to win this sales opportunity and is it worth winning? Ruthless qualification and ongoing discovery and discernment are the hallmark of top sales performers. The exact same thing can be said for top poker players. As the great Kenny Rogers sang in The Gambler, "You've got know when to hold 'em. Know when to fold 'em. Know when to walk away. And know when to run." Good selling! #saas #sales #saassales #salesenablement #salestraining

What is the single most important thing in sales? A healthy and well qualified sales pipeline. It is the barometer for sales success. And sales failure. If you analyze the root cause of sales failures, it almost always comes back to the lack of a quality sales pipeline. Layoffs due to over hiring new sales reps? Peel back the onion and that really means that you didn't have enough sales pipeline to support all of the new sales reps. Shouldn't that analysis have been done before spending all of the time and money on hiring the new sales reps? Didn't make your sales numbers? Why? Poor field sales execution. What if the field sales team execution was flawless, but there simply wasn't enough sales pipeline to make your quarterly sales numbers? Is that still poor field sales execution? If you look at most sales models, they have headcount factors, ramp up factors, conversion rates, etc. But what they lack the most focus on is arguably the single most important factor to sales success... the sales pipeline KPIs. There is the baseline assumption that you'll need 3-5X in sales pipeline to make your sales numbers. In fact, the sales pipeline column in most sales model spreadsheets is often reverse engineered off of the revenue goal with conversion rates and sales cycle lengths factored in. Successful data driven sales leaders know that the sales pipeline is the foundation for their sales success. They obsess over it. There is a huge amount of emphasis and focus on building and maintaining a healthy sales pipeline to feed your sales engine. They have a separate sales pipeline analysis call every week. It's not lumped into the sales forecast call as an afterthought. If you want to learn a lot about a sales organization by asking a single question... ask them to tell you about their sales pipeline. The length of their answer to that question is incredibly revealing.

What is the most under valued job in SaaS sales? You could make the argument that it is the SDR/BDR role and I would not disagree. But I'd submit to you that it is the CRO version 1.0 of the SaaS startup sales team. Let's review some real world stats, shall we? Only 4% of all SaaS startups achieve $1M in ARR and it takes on average 2.5 years to do that. And only .4% of all SaaS startups ever achieve $10M in ARR. Expressed differently, 96% of all SaaS startups fail to achieve $1M in ARR and 99.6% of all SaaS startups fail to achieve $10M in ARR. Back to the CRO v1.0 role being under valued and appreciated. As a CRO v1, you are taking a job with ridiculously high failure rates based on grossly unrealistic revenue and growth goals set by VCs. You are tasked with selling a v1.0 product that typically is missing core functionality that customers need to make a purchase decision. And you don't have any production reference customers that you can use in your sales pursuits. You have to build a GTM sales strategy, figure out your ICP, recruit and build an early stage sales team, create comp plans and territories, build sales tools and sales pipelines from scratch. Decide on the sales and marketing tools that you will use based on limited budgets. You have to roll up your sleeves and sell yourself. You have to prepare for and conduct Board meetings. You have to create a forecasting process and pipeline review call. Figure out new sales rep onboarding and training processes. Deal with sales performance and personnel issues. All the while knowing that the clock is ticking on your tenure and that there is a loaded gin, cocked and pointed at your temple waiting to be fired as the sacrificial lamb. You fight, scratch and claw your way to some early customer wins and then you have to put on your customer service hat when the software does not perform "as advertised". All of this presents a level of stress and pressure that most people will never experience in their careers. You get fired and your successor comes in as the white knight. The CRO v2.0 gets the luxury of resetting revenue and growth expectations to be more realistic. They inherit all of the good things that you built from scratch and call them their own. They blame you for anything that goes wrong for the next year. And if they don't hit the numbers, then it's on to CRO v3.0 and the merry go round continues. #CRO #saas #sales

Summer College Internships. When should students start applying and looking? Asking for a friend. #collegeinternships #internships #summerinternships

This is the Alpha Geek. They are often involved in Enterprise Technology evaluations and decisions. They don't have budgetary authority. They don't have people reporting to them. They don't tend to talk a lot or ask a lot of questions in meetings with sales teams. But to overlook and ignore them as a sales team... well you do so at your own peril. They often have incredible influence in the decision process. While they can't say the final yes. They definitely can say a final no. They can be sneaky and soft spoken as they ask a seemingly innocuous question to the sales team. Yet that single benign question and your answer as a sales team can ultimately win or lose you the deal. Beware of the Alpha Geek!

Anyone in my Boston, MA LI network looking to hire a summer intern? Please PM me for an introduction. See below... Here is an awesome candidate: I am a currently a Junior at The University of Alabama working towards a bachelor’s degree in marketing with a minor in sales. With a strong academic background and experience in customer service, I am seeking a summer internship in the field of technology sales where I can develop my skills in a professional environment.   My ideal internship position would: - Be hybrid (ideally in the Boston, MA area) - Be paid - Have a welcoming company culture - Involve projects to better learn the industry - Allow room to build a network of like-minded professionals - Provide the opportunity to be challenged #internship #salesintern #hiringinterns

Anyone in my LI network looking to hire a Director of Business Development? I know a strong candidate who is an expert at crafting compelling value propositions and messaging into pipeline producing demand generation campaigns and programs. Please PM me if interested in an introduction. #saleshiring #demandgen #bizdev

Looking to hire an awesome Account Exec based in SoCal? I may have the perfect candidate. She is a highly motivated business professional with a proven track record of sales excellence, consistently outperforming goals and delivering high customer satisfaction. With 6 years as a Sales Manager, managing the entire sales cycle from qualifying leads to closing high-value deals and consistently exceeding quota, she is looking to leverage her skillset as an Account Executive in the software industry. Please PM me if you are interested in an introduction. She won't be on the market for long. #saashiring #saleshiring #aehiring #sales #saassales