Bravado

The verdict is in on AI SDR’s. They render minuscule results and high churn rates. “But, VC’s are betting on what they’ll look like in 7 years.” Cool. Know what their customers are betting on? Results right now. If you want to scale revenue today, and not… 7 years from now… you have to hire humans. And you have to hire humans who are skilled enough to reach prospects who have been bombarded with atrocious AI reachout. The demand for incredibly talented Sales humans just keeps going up. Don’t squander your chances of finding it by betting on AI to replace it.

🚨 The countdown is on! 🚨 Hire Innovations 2024 is just around the corner, and spots are filling up fast. 🔥 If you're already thinking about your 2025 hiring plans—or trying to catch up 🫣—you won't want to miss this three day, live, virtual event from November 19-21, starting at 1 PM ET daily. Get ready to learn from industry experts and innovators, including Anna Thielke, Founder & CEO of Mantis & Co.; Kate O'Connor, CPACC, VP & Practice Leader, Digital Accessibility & XD of Onward Search; Torri Wright Ma.Ed., CEO of BEHCA; Justine Haigh, PhD, President of Fidgetech; Austin Anderson, CTO of Recruitics; Crystal Lay, Chief People Officer & Chief Executive of GBS Worldwide; Dan Lockhart, Recruiting Manager of SonderMind; and Sahil Mansuri, CEO & Co-founder of Bravado. Here’s what each day has in store 👇 🌟 Day 1: Hiring the Top 1% of Talent  💡 Day 2: Tapping into Hidden Talent: Disabilities and Neurodiversity 🦾 Day 3: AI in Hiring Don’t miss this chance to future-proof your hiring strategy. Secure your free spot today! 🔗 https://bit.ly/3Z3YJww

Did you lose that bet you made about AI replacing sales people? Need to hire some humans? We recently wrote two guides for anyone looking for AE’s in SaaS right now. The first is for anyone looking to slice their time to hire and level up their interview process. “How to Hire a Rockstar AE in 10 Days” The second is specifically for Founders looking to make their FIRST sales hire. “Going from Founder-Led to Sales-Led” If you need to get your hands on either of these, let us know in the comments. AI won’t be closing deals for you any time soon. So, learn how to hire better humans. 

When hiring for Sales at an early stage SaaS startup, you need to look for the sales reps/leaders who have already been through the wringer. That’s the only way to know if they’ll survive the wringer you’re about to put them through. You don’t have enablement in place. They can’t lean on brand recognition. They’re going to be cold calling into a market that has never seen your logo. Someone from Big Tech supported by a killer marketing engine, full tech stack, and bustling SDR team will be down for the count in their first quarter at a Series A or B org.  

To the SaaS Founders still closing all their own deals, we see you.   You’re in the trenches day after day, bringing in the revenue.   You’re crushing it. Fighting the good fight. But, you’ve still got the rest of the business to run, and it’s looking like time to bring on a sales team.   Before you hire your first AE, read the cheat sheet we wrote.   We’ve laid out everything you need to know to find the right Founding AE so your revenue can keep growing while you keep juggling everything else. Read it here: https://lnkd.in/gW4akG7c

SaaS is getting a new meaning. “The cloud transition was software-as-a-service […] the AI transition is service-as-a-software.”  Thank you, Sequoia Capital, for that banger! With AI, SaaS is replacing labor with software.   This means the TAM for SaaS just exploded bigger than our wildest dreams - gobbling up the services market.   And demand for SaaS sales talent is about to get really wild. Buckle up.

Retention 👏 begins 👏 at 👏 hiring.👏 If your sales team is like a leaky bucket due to attrition, the holes might actually be in your recruiting process. You can’t expect reps to hit quota and/or be happy at your company if you haven’t accurately matched them to your current company stage, ICP, and product. Sales is extremely contextual. A top performer at a Series C selling a CRM to national insurance companies may not hit quota at a Series A app builder using AI to make automated sales funnels for wedding photographers. You have to know what matters when matchmaking your sales play to your sales talent. Past performance isn’t everything. Refine your recruiting practices. Make sure you’re looking for the right success indicators. Better candidate placement can radically extend your talent tenure. #sales #saleshiring #salesrecruiting #recruiting #bravadotalent  

The difference between a 150% of quota vs 95% quota performer is RAZOR thin: == 150% - Asks those really tough 2-3 questions at the end of the call which uncover the hidden objections (cc: Kara Kayrouz) - Leverages social media to build a brand that drives inbound - Used just the right words to assuage a customer when they are at that critical decisioning moment - Nails every call, every time, and just never ever misses the layup === 95% - Asks all the required questions, follows the process, executes their training - Shares all of the required corporate content in their own voice - Hears the customer's hesitancy at that crucial decisioning moment and knows that the problem is - Runs a nearly perfect process nearly every time. == It's razor thin. But compounds on every call, every deal, every month, every quarter....

Your “Sales problem” may not be a Sales problem.  And before you point the finger, it’s not a Marketing problem, either. Many early Founders will spin up a mediocre product without fully understanding the use case and without really knowing how to price it. Then, they shift 100% of the responsibility of revenue generation to the GTM team.   While Sales and Marketing fight amongst themselves in the greatest trick the devil ever pulled, Product operates in a silo with none of the blame.   VALIDATE FIRST!!! Then, Go to Market. Before using Sales and Marketing as the scapegoat, Your job as a Founder is to verify: Is the TAM big enough… even if we only capture 10 - 30%?   Are they willing to pay the price I’m asking for what I’m offering? Only when you can honestly say yes, do you earn the right to build a GTM strategy. #sales #marketing #gtm #gotomarket #founders #productmarketfit #bravado #bravadotalent

Looking for the next great sales leader? Look at people reporting to great sales leaders. Sales is an apprenticeship career - where sellers only learn to be the best by apprenticing under the best. Lineage weighs a lot in this industry because training and development are key differentiators between the A team and the B team. Leaders like 🏄♂️ Scott Leese and Matt Alvers can point to several people who went on to be great leaders in their own right after working for them. Why? Because they demand excellence. You won’t report to them for long if you’re not putting in the effort to become the best. There are a million reasons why startup founders choose more junior sales leaders over the big names - and they’re all good reasons! If you’re not ready, you’re not ready. That’s okay! But if you want some assurance that the junior sales leader you’re interviewing is going to prove themself at your company, make sure they’ve got a big name on their reference list - who they’ve actually worked under. Those folks know potential and they won’t bullshit you about it. #salesleaders #techsales #hiring #bravadotalent #execsearch