Tyler Hogge’s Post

Preach!!! I've been in tech sales for 15 years... I've achieved or exceeded quota 10 out of those 15 years. I'm not perfect by any means, I've made the wrong call, I've played the wrong cards, and I've lost deals because of those mistakes, BUT... There were common denominators every year when I missed my number, and those most commonly had to do with poor product market fit, an unqualified sales addressable market, or misalignment with account segmentation. If you have a solid product with identified product market fit, a quantified sales addressable market calculated backwards from that product market fit, and segmentation that optimizes how you'll manage and attack that addressable market to maximize revenue, then decent reps will be good, good reps will be great, and great reps will absolutely blow out their numbers.

Don't think this is an absolute rule. I've spent the past 10 years coaching early-stage founders how to sell their product. Yes, sometimes there are product limitations that affect the ability to sell, but more often than not, the sales problem is a sales problem -- founders that don't understand enterprise sales -- multi-threading, ICPs, customer discovery, mutual action plans, ROI assessments, and the mechanics of how to sell to the enterprise.

Tell this to any early stage CEO. Most will react like you spat on their baby, even though it's true.

I remember an interview years ago where you talked a little about comp plans to keep that aligned. Would be cool to see a deeper-dive blog on that now!

100% true. It's pretty demotivating to the sales org when the leadership is screaming at them to sell more, but no one wants to buy their product. If you have sales people that have moral clarity and they know they are selling an inferior product, that's a tough balancing act.

Accountability is huge here. It’s easy to pass the blame onto sales. Hard to admit that your product isn’t good enough.

This is why YC's "make something people want" advice is so important. Sales can be made by just about anyone when the buyer really wants what you're selling.

I always like the golden goose analogy. If you could sell geese that produced solid gold eggs, you wouldn't really have a sales issue.

In my opinion, your sales team has to feel fully confident in the delivery component of the product to effectively sell. Interdepartmental alignment is crucial.

This is why we built startwave: to help startups get the inputs they need to make a great product through customer discovery and pilot clients. The best sales channel is a compelling why and a fantastic product. If you’re interested in discussing further, let’s connect!