Europe's B2B SaaS Sales Podcast: Recent Episodes
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B2B SaaS Sales is still an emerging domain in Europe. European salespeople and their leaders share actionable initiatives, best practices and insights on how you can source and close more deals faster and become a better sales professional.
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Lukas Götting & Robin Engelbrecht haben 60+ Sales Expert:innen interviewed in Ihrem Sales Circle Podcast.
Hier sind 5 “Nuggets” aus unserem Dialog im Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast.
1️⃣ Konsistenz ist König #1
“Attitude kannst Du nicht fixen”.
Nur wer beständig ist und bleibt wird früher oder später erfolgreich.
Dies gilt auch für eine hohe Eigeninitiative, beständig besser zu werden.
2️⃣ Kultur ist König #2
Lukas & Robin haben viel in die Team-Kultur investiert.
Bis heute gibt es morgens einen gemeinsamen Start in den Tag.
Beide haben früh Aufgabenpakete für z.B. Kaltkakquise abgegeben.
3️⃣ Trefft Euer Team persönlich
Du bist die Summe der Menschen, mit denen Du Dich umgibt.
Gerade im Aufbau von Sales Teams ist es wichtig, präsent zu sein.
Nur Video Calls ersetzen den physischen Austausch zusammen nicht.
4️⃣Mikromanagement bringt nichts, Kennzahlen schon
Qualität und Konsistenz vor Quantität.
Deal Coaching vor “Lass mich mal machen”.
“Wie nahe ist die Person am Kunden?” vor “Telefonier mal mehr.”
5️⃣Nicht erfolgreiche Verkäufer:innen = Nicht erfolgreiche Sales Leader:innen
“Welche Rolle nehmen New Hires im eigenen Team ein?”
Sales Reps für Misserfolge verantwortlich zu machen greift zu kurz.
Wenn Verkäufer:innen nicht performen liegt dies auch an der Führungskraft.
salessuccess #podcast #startupsales #startup #salesplaybook #b2bsaas
I personally hate tenders / RfPs / RfIs, with a passion.
Because they often lead nowhere if you are out of control.
Patrick interviewed 200+ companies on that after experiencing similar pain over 20+ years, which is why he co-founded Sequesto.
Here is a great 5 point tender checklist that emerged from our podcast:
1️⃣ Can I even win?
Many tenders are written for your competitors and already pre-decided.
(Why) Did you (not) know about a tender before receiving a request.
2️⃣ Would this contribute to my core business?
Answering tenders is often cumbersome and therefore costly.
You don’t want to involve your team for non-core business activities.
3️⃣ (How) Am I uniquely positioned to win?
You should be crystal clear why a customer should select you.
If you cannot make that argument, how should a buyer?
4️⃣ Is the timeline aligned with my internal capabilities?
Tendering is not a “let’s quickly do this game”.
Large companies have a dedicated team for this for a reason.
If you need to rely on external resources already here, be cautious.
5️⃣Is the tender stating the customer’s pain specifically enough?
If the problem is not framed clearly, you cannot craft a specific solution.
In this case strive to better understand before asking to being understood.
salessuccess #podcast #startupsales #startup #salesplaybook #b2bsaas
Nadja helped lemlist scale 1->10M+ ARR quickly as 1st sales hire.
Taking ownership of her career was a game changer for her.
Nadja Komnenic grew up in Serbia, where sales is not a respected career path.
Here are the 5 key take aways from Nadja’s sales journey on our podcast:
1️⃣ Don’t wait for others to make you successful
This allowed her to move quickly in a hyper-growth company.
Instead, she learnt sales from podcasts, interviews, blogs etc.
Nadja did not wait for Guillaume Moubeche for guidance to execute.
2️⃣ Be adamant with your time management
Nadja worked all day, every day early in her career.
At one point, she realised that taking a step back is highly useful.
She prefers to be adamant with her time management vs time blockers.
3️⃣ Imagine if you had 0 tech in sales.
Doing things 100% manually has huge value.
Go “customer first”, imagine a day in the life of your buyer.
Only once validated move to scale and automate sales motion.
4️⃣ Make peers successful to spark action.
Great coaching & training is technically useful.
But reps will only take relentless action once peers succeed.
Even initially resistant reps will adopt new practices once they see success.
5️⃣ Focus on what you can control - on average.
Set your own goals for activities to be successful.
Ask yourself regularly “What could I have done better?”
If you do what you & your leader expected from you…
…but the outcome is not there - let’s analyse it together.
salessuccess #podcast #startupsales #startup #salesplaybook #b2bsaas
Raphael is "playing host" for a dialogue on Manuel's perspective on "RevOps" with a focus on Customer Success & subscription management to discuss
- How CRMs stop at Closed/Won and do not cover Customer Success
- For what "jobs to be done" Hubspot "vs" Salesforce make sense
- How to reflect multi-year subscription contracts with one-time revenue components in your systems
- Why maintaining multiple systems for marketing, sales, customer success & finance is messy
- How an ideal solution to go "beyond Quote-to-Cash" would need to look like - and who could build it
- What to do with limited resources until that solution exists
144 “Vertrieb spielt sich fast immer gleich ab(?)” mit Patrick Utz, Coach & Salestrainer“Vertrieb spielt sich fast immer gleich ab”.
Inwiefern dies wirklich so ist durfte ich mit Patrick Utz besprechen.
👉 Hier sind 5 Top 1% Sales Nuggets von unserem Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast diskutiert
1️⃣ Geschäftsführer:innen sind “tolle natürliche SDRs”
Auch als Geschäftsleitungsmitglied bei Campari hat Patrick konsistent “Türen geöffnet” für die Firma, auch um glaubwürdig gegenüber dem eigenen Verkaufsteam zu bleiben. (“Ich bin nicht CEO und mein Titel funktioniert nicht in der Kaltakquise” zählt nicht.)
2️⃣ Akquise-Zeitfenster auf Zielkund:innen ausrichten
CEOs von Industrieunternehmen sind oft gut 07:00-08:00 oder 12:00-13:00 erreichbar.
Es geht im Sales darum, den KUNDEN erfolgreich zu machen.
Nicht um möglichst in der eigenen Komfortzone zu bleiben.
3️⃣ Hürden aufbrechen “im Rudel” mit Call Sessions - mit Live-Calls
Patrick macht nie fiktive Calls - immer direkt mit realen Kunden, gemeinsam.
Verkäufer:innen das richtige “Werkzeug” dafür zu geben essenziell.
4️⃣ Qualifikation professionell durchführen VOR dem Outreach
Relevanz ist wichtiger als Volumen - für die Person, nicht nur das Unternehmen.
Es gibt kaum etwas Frustrierendes als Verkauf ohne die Möglichkeit, erfolgreich zu sein.
5️⃣ C-Level direkt ansprechen lohnt sich
Geschäftsführer:innen haben eine wertvolle “übergeordnete” Sicht auf Herausforderungen.
Klar wird es dann operativer in der Zusammenarbeit - aber an den richtigen Themen.
Spielt sich Vertrieb nun fast immer gleich ab Patrick?
Technisch ja, inhaltlich weitgehend.
Branchen-Referenzen helfen aber definitiv in der Kundenakquise.
Spannenderweise kommt dieses Bedenken kaum noch auf CxO-Ebene.
podcast #startupsales #b2bsaassales #startup #salesplaybook
There is a huge difference between selling and truly understanding the pains of a customer. Sascha Meier brings up amazing and insightful examples of his own career that illustrate this difference and help you change to become more curious and change from selling to "helping your customers buy". This can make a huge difference in your career. Happy listening!
Nicole started her sales career at SAP back in 2007. Now she is leading a team of Account Managers as well as Account Executives as CSO at the CRM company BSI. Have you heard of an outside-in vs. inside-out approach? I did not. Nicole explains what she means by that and how you can apply it in your company.
Dave started as Sales no. 1 with Osso VR around 4 years ago. Now, they employ more than 215 people remotely. No offices. Dave learned what it needs to build a strong connection between team members so that the fluctuation is not going through the roof and he shares those tactical learnings in this episode. Obviously, they are also using VR for that. Listen in and learn how.
The fragmented B2B SaaS SDR/AE/CSM model slows down learning.
Promoting SDRs too fast might be setting them up to fail.
John Barrows is a Top 0.001% Sales Legend “door-to-door printer full-cycle sales graduate”, playing the infinite game and enjoying the journey.
👉 Here are 5 Top 1% Tactical Sales Nuggets from him on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast (1st comment).
1️⃣ Get commitment for a “follow-up on the follow-up”
When asked for a follow-up email, commit indeed.
Send 5-7 bullets on priority, timing and impact.
Realise senior people reply much more often.
Aim for a 25-30% rate.
Close 90% of them.
2️⃣ Replace the subject line 2x
After 2-3 emails, change the subject to “Still Interested?”
“Either way, I don’t want to unnecessarily email you”.
If unsuccessful, change again to “Did I lose you?”
3️⃣ Focus on quality before quantity
Do NOT over-automate your outreach for quantity’s sake.
Focus instead on how to integrate your touches.
Impact people in different ways.
Be a “mini-marketer” yourself.
The “Social” matters.
4️⃣ Relevance trumps Personalisation all day
People do not care about personalisation.
They care about relevance.
Stop fake personalisation.
Be relevant.
5️⃣ Hire for attitude instead of skills
You can technically develop B- to A- players.
You can teach skills, technique & methods.
But you cannot teach attitude.
Be consistent. For years.
Ignore competition.
Play the infinite game. 🚀🚀🚀
Thanks so much for your contribution to helping sales leaders step up their game!
We know that people only care about themselves. As a salesperson, you should listen a lot more than you talk. The ability to be in silence is one of the most difficult and valuable skills you can develop as a salesperson. And listening is not easy. We talk about what is needed to really develop that muscle, and how you can answer to some of the most difficult objections. Have fun and happy learning.
Have you heard of the challenger sales approach? Most salespeople have heard of it, but do not know how to actually use it. Manuel Marquine explains exactly how he is using that effective sales methodology....and much more. Listen in and learn!
Firaas is sharing all he knows about keeping customers in your SaaS business. What do you need to understand from a customer perspective? Furthermore, he is answering the question of how he thinks CSM and Sales should be working together to grow an account effectively. Listen in and learn!
Sales is about people. BtoB is BtoI. Every sales process is business to individual and much of what matters are the people you are talking to. Who they are, what they are interested in, and how they react. You need to adjust your approach and your talking to the individual. That is what Daniel and Patrick talk about in this episode. For a lot of tactical advice, tune in and learn
Money is not the answer to sales hiring.
Embrace consistency & focus.
Enter Maximilian Karpf.
👉 Here are 5 insights from him on how to qualify more & better
with Max Karpf on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast (1st comment).
1️⃣ Never miss 1:1s with your team
It is so important to stay close to your sales reps.
Therefore also pick up the phone, make some cold calls.
This way, you retain empathy & respect for your team & customers.
2️⃣ Doing “everything sales” alone is hard, but fun.
“Filling the sales funnel” is NOT an entry-level position!
Max is now an SDR again for himself - and loves 1st calls.
Because that’s where you can make the biggest difference.
3️⃣ Let’s give SDRs more love.
SDRs do so much more than executing sequences.
Work towards helping your SDRs explain what they do in 1 sentence.
If they can’t, give them more responsibility, empower them & understand “the why”.
4️⃣ Consider “The 1 Tab Agreement”.
Stay consistent & focused on what works.
That’s why Max agreed with his sales reps to keep only 1 tab open at a time.
For 6 hours a day, every day. For the other 2 hours, explore & run experiments.
5️⃣ Money is not the solution to sales hiring.
“With great money comes great pressure to deliver”.
Offering 6-figure base salaries will not fix the talent acquisition problem.
Max expects the supply-demand balance to shift early 2023…stay tuned… :)
Thanks so much for your contribution to helping sales leaders step up their game!
Andreas shares his two best tips on how to not f*ck up the first meetings with your customer. And this applies as much to Europe as it probably does to any other region.
Volker Hein is the Master of the pitch. All said. Volker brought two questions (not tips this time), which will change the way how you think about deals and pitches. Have fun and happy learning.
Nobody Regrets Qualifying Out. But so few people do it enough.
Andy Whyte has a few thoughts here on value, stakeholders & process.
👉 Here are 5 Insights from him on how to qualify more & better
with Andy Whyte on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast (1st comment).
1️⃣ Focus on value instead of your pipeline.
Very few sales people qualify “hard” enough.
They focus primarily on if they can add a deal to their pipeline.
Instead focus on if you, your company & your offering adds enough value.
2️⃣ Trust is built upon value & respect.
Trust is hugely underdiscussed in sales.
Lead with social proof from customer case studies.
Have an open conversation, identify pains, rank them.
Then implicate & quantify pains & how you can help solve them.
3️⃣ “Transfer pain” by being prepared.
Don’t prepare your demo “talking about all your bells & whistles.
Instead invest into preparing insights on why buyers take action.
Then leverage those to share why other companies took action already.
4️⃣ MEDDICC is NOT a retrospective after-action review tool.
Adding 7 fields to Salesforce will not make reps more successful.
Because sales people hate admin work, but love actionable insights.
Therefore use MEDDICC starting in your preparation before even the 1st call.
5️⃣MEDDICC is “like Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) for qualification”.
BJJ isn't the only 'framework' in MMA for “groundwork”.
Champions have used Judo, Sambo, Wrestling among others.
But simply no other framework has the quantity of Champions as Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu..
Thanks so much for your contribution to making qualification so much better!
podcast #startupsales #b2bsaassales #startup #salesplaybook #qualification
Cosuno is a success story from Germany. Michael started at Cosuno in November 2020 when they were 8 people. Today, the company employs almost 200, out of which 60 are in sales. How can you find and hire the right talent so quickly in the current "war for talent"? Michael shares a few answers to that question.
Pricing is part science, part art. And huge for profitability.
Jeffrey Tjiok worked with 25+ B2B Tech companies, many of them VC-backed unicorns.
👉 Here are 5 Insights from him on how to make pricing a game changer for you
with Jeffrey Tjiok on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast (1st comment).
1️⃣ Master your pricing toolbox to defend value
Many startups immediately rush into discounting.
Instead find out WHY the offered price seems too high.
Then offer value-add, low-cost items sequentially in the process.
2️⃣ Embrace long-term quid pro quo
Ask what you get in return instead of giving in to incumbents “kicking tires”.
Steer the discussion away from price towards focusing fully on value.
Frame concessions with a clear (time) limit, e.g. 1st-year discounts.
3️⃣ “Everyone’s responsible for pricing”
Pricing is one of the most cross-functional disciplines.
Product marketing has to tell a compelling story around the offering.
Sales needs clear pricing guidelines to close profitable, attractive deals.
This requires close alignment of the company’s leadership (CRO x CFO x CMO).
4️⃣ Your pricing needs to follow your business objectives
One of Jeffrey’s clients moved from volume- to revenue-focus and is now valued at $10B.
You need to decide first if growth, profitability, retention or win rates are most important.
As you scale quickly, getting pricing right is crucial to build a sustainable business.
5️⃣ Pricing can have a huge impact on profitability
Many Silicon Valley companies follow a “reach first, rich second” model.
If you’re a VC-backed, hypergrowth scaleup, that’s great.
Martin Giese is a B2B Startup Sales legend that interviewed many hypergrowth scaleups such as Personio, SAP Hybris, LeanIX & many more for "Fast Forward: Accelerating B2B sales for startups".
👉 Here are 3 Insights from him on how to scale 0-100(!) million ARR quickly on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast (1st comment)
1️⃣ Increase your prices with confidence
Go to your pricing page and increase prices by 20%.
You could charge (way) more without losing deals.
Most startups don’t price aggressively enough.
2️⃣ Emphasise NRR - Net Revenue Retention
Achieving negative churn starts with your mindset that closing a deal is only the start.
How the revenue from your existing customers evolves is quintessential in SaaS.
Aim for 100%, if you have >200% Martin would like to get involved, so write him.
3️⃣ Scaling 10->100M ARR is also a mindset
Personio’s founder Hanno Renner decided to raise his 2019 VC round in the US.
Because no VC in DACH had the track record & ambition to think this big.
Why not hire 10x the people you do today if you believe it works?
4️⃣ You can’t afford to not fix your bottlenecks - like churn
If churn is not under control, you will reach stagnation mode sooner or later.
Fixing 1% of churn is equal to fix 10% of your sales performance.
This also means getting the fundamentals & more right.
5️⃣ If in analysis-paralysis, validate hypotheses quickly
You cannot afford NOT to take decisions regularly on an ongoing basis.
If unsure, look for ways how to assess your past data “experiments”.
Then define inexpensive, fast hypotheses to validate for the future.
Jan’s getting job offers for 3x the money he is making today - rejecting them all.
Because he’s prioritising People, Product & Personal Development before money (now).
👉 Here are 3 Insights from him on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast (1st comment)
1️⃣ Write like you speak
Jan validates his outreach with his growth manager, reading it on a mobile phone & more.
Then being relentless about A/B testing if the system is running reasonably well.
And never forget: Write like you speak, keep it natural, don’t overthink it.
Have a “Player instead of Prisoner” mindset to put humans first.
2️⃣ Professionalise your sales stack
Jan is using best of breed tools across the whole sales stack:
-
Salesloft for Sales Engagement top funnel
-
Lusha / Lead IQ for data gathering
-
Chili Piper for meeting scheduling
-
Gong / Unique for call reviews
-
Reachdesk for small gifts
3️⃣ Attract & retain top sales talent: People, Product, Personal Development
Pleo raised 9-figures at a Unicorn valuation, growing 300 -> 700 people in 4 months.
Especially at hypergrowth, Pleo is “values first” and emphasises that in hiring.
In a company which is “going places”, in a space that is scaling quickly.
Jan’s priority in life is learning from people he love’s working with.
podcast #startupsales #b2bsaassales #startup #salesplaybook #hypergrowth
“Run-rate selling” sucks. The constant pressure, pace & pain of potentially not hitting quota.
Jamal Reimer went from missing quota to closing 8-figure deals repeatably. Here’s how:
👉 Here are 3 Insights on how to (>)10x the size of your biggest deal from having a true enterprise sales legend on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast:
1️⃣ Dig a well before you’re thirsty
Provide tons of value to executives and key opinion leaders BEFORE you need their help.
Jamal shared valuable industry insights with his management team proactively.
The first time he needed the support of an executive, they were more than happy to help.
2️⃣ Run-rate selling is fundamental. Mega deals are game-changing.
You’re never escape run-rate selling. As a company and individual early on.
How much of your time you can invest into a mega deal depends on your account list.
Jamal had 4 accounts at the time of closing a $53M deal. And 2 did not want to talk to him.
3️⃣ Embrace multi-threading in a multi-product setting with a major account plan
Jamal’s account spreadsheets “were a kilometer long” to understand an organization.
At this deal size, orchestrating the buyer journey is also hugely important internally.
He managed his internal organisation in weekly meetings, but knew he did not want to go into management…
…which is why he founded his own company now! 🤩
👉 Listen to the full episode in the 1st comment
podcast #startupsales #b2bsaassales #startup #salesplaybook #enterprisesales
Telling somebody "to be authentic" does not mean much at first. Because authenticity is relative to the person you are telling to be so. Martin and I unlock what it means in the context of selling. Because what we actually want to say is that some traits are important in sales (be honest, direct, speak about problems, say no to business that has no positive long term effects) and that those traits should come naturally to salespeople. What do you think?
Bisho Chamssuddin went “from molecular biology to sales”, thriving in face-to-face sales.
He is OK with rejection & resilience, but not unrealistic goals for SDRs without getting external support.
Here are 3 Insights on how to build a predictable demand generation process after getting a lot of sales coaching from our dialogue in our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast:
1️⃣ Rejection requires resilience
The rejection he experienced was “unreal” in terms of having 200+ “outreaches” per day.
And getting rejected 180+ times of it. Every day.
A key for him was to not take rejection personally & focus on improving the process.
2️⃣ Record & review your sales calls
Both the sales manager and the rep should review their sales conversations.
Then reconstruct these conversation in mock-up calls. Then “rinse & repeat”.
At scale, not only for 1-2 mock-up calls.
3️⃣ Aim for people with an elite athlete mindset
You need people who want to be the best at what they do.
To improve 1% every day. To get feedback, implement quickly, and continue learning.
This has 100% to do with getting the right coaching to build the right sales systems & 0% with product training.
P.S. PM me if you want to get on Bisho’s weekly Wednesday SDR small group coaching call.
podcast #startupsales #b2bsaassales #startup #salesplaybook #salesrecruiting
Christian Fontius studied business, but learnt 0 about B2B Sales there.
So he went “learning by doing” as StackFuel’s 1st business employee (shout out to Leo Marose)
Here are 3 Insights on how he’s bringing innovation with AI to a traditional market (wind industry) from our dialogue in our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast:
1️⃣ Sales is Service & Stories
Detach from the outcome & embrace a service mindset.
Give your buyer’s champion a nice story to tell internally.
If this does not work out, don’t get frustrated, but ask “Can you help me understand better”
2️⃣ Rehearse your 30 second intro for cold calls
When cold calling, you face a strong attention constraint.
You therefore want to have a rock-solid, sharp intro pitch.
Christian even uses bao (a Conversational Intelligence solution to iterate quickly here.
3️⃣ Be hyper-precise when framing the buyer journey.
“This is how we run things. After this call, here’s what will happen next.
We will run an initial collaboration for 10 wind turbines for a low 5-figure investment.
When this works well, we roll-out the solution company-wide for a 6-figure investment.
“BONUS”: Christian sees a misunderstanding in DACH about sales being about “only money” instead of solving customer problems.
P.S. Turbit closed 2 deals on the day of the recording & is looking for a Senior Account Executive
podcast #startupsales #b2bsaassales #startup #salesplaybook #salesrecruiting
Patrice and Patrick talk about the single most important metric "pipeline velocity rate", how it is calculated and what you should do in case the number is off. Additionally, Patrice shares insights into his sales process. Listen in and learn!
Bruno started in enterprise sales back in 1995 - that is longer than most salespeople on this planet. He has seen how buying changed and what that means for sales organizations. That is why we are talking about older methodologies such as MEDDICC and how we should be using them today.
Marvin Karis hat die Verkaufsstrukturen bei Echobot mitaufgebaut.
Bisher haben alle 40+ Verkäufern “Full-Stack” gearbeitet (Lead Gen + Closing).
Im Rahmen der Internationalisierung evaluiert Echobot nun den Split BDR/AE/x.
Hier sind 3 Insights aus unserem Dialog im Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast:
1️⃣ Je besser Produkt & Strukturen, desto einfacher der Verkauf
Der angehende Split BDR / Account Executive ist ermöglicht durch ein einfacher zu verkaufendes Produkt.
Weiterhin hilft dem Team ein professionelles Stack sowie team-übergreifende Pods.
2️⃣ Hire for attitude, train for skill
Echobot setzt auf Absolvent(inn)en von Universitäten und entwickelt diese dann proaktiv.
Daher sind Soft Skills via Bewerbungsvideo wie Coachability & Offenheit hier wichtiger als Hard Skills wie Prospecting & Closing.
Auch mit mittlerweile 120 Mitarbeitern sind Marvin & Team das Aufrechterhalten Startup-Spirits mit gemeinsamen Events, Perks & eigenen Formaten sehr wichtig.
3️⃣ Verschmelzung von Marketing & Verkauf
Vertriebsmitarbeiter bauen selber ein starkes Brand auf, was Marketing befähigt.
Marketing kann daraus bessere Landing Pages mit Custom Audiences bauen.
Der Vertrieb funktioniert hier als Ohr, das Marketing als Sprachrohr.
podcast #startupsales #b2bsaassales #startup #salesplaybook #salesrecruiting
Murad has a long history in telesales. He knows that what you say is very important, but how to say that is even more so. And there are methods that help you make changes in your voice and become a much better cold caller. These methods are basically changing the hardware of your system (mouth, jaw) and help you a much better communicator
Alessandro has been in IT sales for the past 12 years. He is a master in building relationships through genuine feedback, real compliments and asking for personal goals. If you really mean it, according to Alessandro, you will be able to create those relationships much faster.
We have been talking about a lot of sales tactics. But doing sales all day is not possible if you do not feel great and start the day right, thinks Torsten Sauer. That is why he is sharing some tactical tips on starting the day and goal setting with the team and as an individual. Listen in if you also struggle with the long screen times in today's world full of screens.
Oliver is leading >100 salespeople in the SMB business of Personio and was an integral part of building that team. This episode is for aspiring and working sales leaders. The priority of a first-line sales leader is coaching their salespeople to become the best version of themselves. However, many leaders are focusing on strategy and projects instead of training. What about you?
Alex shares some amazingly tactical tips on how you can learn from other company's salespeople. Additionally, Alex and Patrick talk about the difference between selling to technical people compared to business-oriented people. You might not be able to just ask questions in a discovery call but also share some value and be genuinely helpful is going to help a lot.
Tim Fetzer in 2022 staffed a talent within 10 days from 1st call to signed contract.
Speed, attitude, persistency & relationships are crucial in sales recruiting - like in sales.
Actually, recruiting is “doing sales twice a day” - 1x to the candidate & 1x to the company.
Here are 3 key insights I learnt from Tim having him on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales podcast.
1️⃣ Hire for attitude & speed.
You need people who are willing to go the extra mile and make team successful.
Stock options & equity are becoming more valued by sales reps, “everyone is asking for it”.
If the attitude is there, strive to hire “start to finish” within 1-3 weeks.
The hiring managers need to “play along” with this, trust the process and make time.
2️⃣ It’s a marathon at a sprint pace right now.
Lots of companies are looking for hunters with 3-5 years of experience in SaaS.
Candidates often get multiple offers every week with double-digit InMail per week.
Companies are often impatient but unaware of the degree of the war for talent.
3️⃣ Hire the right team leads (like @Ben Bauer)
Sales reps join - and stay with - team leads who help them get to the next level.
This also enables more affordable hiring to hire young hungry talent and develop them.
podcast #startupsales #b2bsaassales #startup #salesplaybook #salesrecruiting
Chris truly is an expert when it comes to recruiting. He first worked as VP at one of the largest recruiting companies worldwide called Adecco and almost 20 years ago started his own company Xenagos. He was also one of the first Sales podcasters in Europe with his "VertriebsFunk Podcast". Chris and Patrick discuss what it takes to recruit great salespeople and how you should build the best recruiting process.
Lisa knows how not to be afraid, create positive tension and disagree with C-level executives of potential customers. Lisa and Patrick uncover the tactical way to the challenger sales approach as she has been using that approach for a long time.
Sandro Meyer won all of his customers at Growthbay from his audience funnel.
Now what is the difference between an audience funnel vs a prospecting funnel?
Here’s 3 insights I gained from having him on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast.
1️⃣ Content contribution is underrated: Many companies invest heavily into creation, hit publish and then “wait, see, and hope for the best”. Instead of re-purposing content “gems”.
2️⃣ Saying no to offer requests:
3️⃣ Don’t skip PMF (Product-Market-Fit): x
Thanks so much for sharing your learnings and insights from the last 10 years as a marketing leader with us Sandro!
selltoscale #salessuccess #salescoaching #salesacceleration #salesplaybook
Jaap Boven worked himself up from SDR to Sales Director in 5 years. He is sharing his experience in regards to compiling a great target list and reaching out to those in a way that you get to talk to them. He also shares some important tips on how you can stand out in today's crowded sales market.
“We need more leads. This will solve all or at least tons of sales problems.
Can you please do outbound sales at scale for me for EUR 2’000-5000 / month?“
“NO - if product-market-fit is not there and you have only few potential buyers.”
Here’s 3 great insights from having him Theo Shikov, CEO & Founder Out2Bound on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast.
1️⃣ Following up is everything: In Europe, there is still this stigma that following up can be negative. It is not. Countless prospects only reply after 5-7 touchpoints. And then become customers.
2️⃣ Embrace Personalisation at scale: Get to the DNA of your target company and buyer. Then decide via “ABC-Bucketing” where to invest into deep personalisation and where to “only” nurture at scale.
3️⃣ Don’t skip PMF (Product-Market-Fit): Scaling outbound sales motion without nailing down your sales arguments and ICP (Ideal Customer Profile) can actually hurt you, especially if your market has <1’000 potential buyers.
Thanks so much for sharing your learnings and insights from the last 6 years with us Theo!
selltoscale #salessuccess #salescoaching #salesacceleration #salesplaybook
Jonathon Ilett is leading sales at Cognism, one of the fastest-growing sales tech scale-ups in Europe with over 300 employees. He faced several challenges young salespeople face in their careers and knows what is needed to become successful. For some great examples of open-ended questions, listen in.
“Before I begin telling you what I think, I want to establish that I’m a “dumb shit” who doesn’t know much relative to what I need to know. Whatever success I’ve had in life has had more to do with my knowing how to deal with my not knowing than anything I know.” (Ray Dalio)
Jonas Gesslein invested 8 years of his career in face-to-face sales on the street (“Dialogmarketing”) before becoming an SDR leader and it was a true pleasure learning from him on having him on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales podcast.
Here are 3 insights he shared on our conversation:
1️⃣ Prioritise learning to (only) KPIs: Enable coachees to figure out solutions themselves and empower them to take action and be confident and proactive themselves to fix problems.
2️⃣ Be incredibly fast in hiring: Jonas dedicated 30-50% of his time as an SDR Leader at Solve Mate to hiring, then strived to “close the deal” within ideally a week if an A+ player.
3️⃣SDRs deserve coaching: Either hire a fantastic sales leader that can lead SDRs. If not in place, get external help & invest into your SDRs to help them ramp quickly & be successful.
Thanks Jonas for sharing these great insights & happy prospecting!
Max worked in several SaaS Sales Leadership positions at such companies as Personio, Homanoo, Oracle and Payfit, and recently started to build his own company. He learned the hard way that measuring important KPIs is really important for decision making in sales and customers success - and something that is not done enough. We are deep-diving into what KPIs you should measure and show you how to improve the game step by step. Happy learning.
SaaStock has grown to be the biggest B2B SaaS Conference in Europe.
But behind the well-known event is a multi-product, fast-growing 7-figure ARR company.
Then revenue went to 0 with COVID-19 but its founder Alex Theuma adapted quickly.
It was a true pleasure having Alex on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast.
1️⃣ Sales-centricity: Alex started SaaStock with 10+ years sales experience and embraced growing revenues & scaling the team with sales at the heart of the organisation.
2️⃣ Adaptability & resilience: Alex needed to scale down the team from 24 to 9 people upon moving from physical to virtual setups, but went 0-1M revenue from virtual conferences.
3️⃣ Educating the market: Professionals where not used to pay for virtual, but only physical events. Employees as well as founders also therefore asked more for discounts or even free tickets, unaware how high the investment is to put an event such as SaaStock is.
Love your “enthusiastic focus” Alex & really looking forward to see you at SaaStock!
Beekeeper is one of Switzerland’s biggest B2B SaaS Startup success stories. But to achieve 8-figure ARR, you need fantastic sales reps closing 6-figure deals.
Oliver Arber is one of the best in the game.
It was a true pleasure having him on our Europe’s B2B SaaS Sales Podcast.
Here’s 3 great insights from him
1️⃣ “Be paranoid”: Constantly “have your radar on” what could go wrong until a deal is closed, avoid the “Happy Ears Phenomenon”, embrace risks and deepen your discovery.
2️⃣ You never do large deals alone: Working closely with your & the prospect’s team, Oliver brings in e.g. Cris Grossmann or Daniel Sztutwojner strategically.
3️⃣ Get a Champion AND a Spy (Coach): You need to know what’s going on in the buyer’s organization at all times, especially if you’re waiting for intelligence but don’t get it.
Special credits to Mila Nussbaumer for keeping Oliver 4.5+ years at Beekeeper because she cares a lot about her people and developed them accordingly!
Raphael Schifferle, newly promoted to CMO at Brugg Lifting has a long background selling cars and industrial products. An angle we have not looked at in the podcast. However, there are still very important takeaways for all sellers in SaaS and tech. Raphael is always preparing well and goes into a customer meeting with a positive mindset. How he manages to do that every day and how he can put the customer's needs in the centre you learn in this episode. Happy learning and stay unique.
Patrick Minder's story is an incredible success. At 34 years old, he is leading Swisscom's Platform and Software B2B sales business - a unit consisting of over 1'000 sellers and supporters. Prior to working at Swisscom, he was building up JLS Digital as CEO and CSO. In this episode, Patrick is sharing some of the wisdom that got him where he is today. The love for people and the product you sell are among those important factors. Happy learning!
Paolo Donnarumma is a sales legend and knows exactly what you need to succeed in large enterprise sales deals. Even though there might be negative short-term consequences, Paolo is an advocate of closing opportunities that are not hot anymore quickly. It sounds easy but is actually really hard. "But they said they buy in three months!" Well, you do not know and you should not make your feelings dependent on that possibility. Free yourself from those opportunities. How you can do that, and other tactical tips, you learn from Paolo in this episode.
For more than 10 years, Manfred has been engaged in tech B2B business development. In his current role as Head of Growth at RAQUEST, he helps the FinTech with scaling up the business and hire talents. Moreover, together with other sales leaders, he has founded acceederate a network of business angels helping B2B startups to win their first customers. In this podcast, Manfred discloses his five golden rules of how to make proof of value/concept phases to sales success:
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Make no commitment without commitment
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Make friends with fans
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Know the enemy
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Lead!
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Be one step ahead
A must-hear for enterprise salespeople
The first episode of this podcast was a discussion between Manuel, Lars and Patrick. That is how it all started. Back then, Lars and Yokoy were at 20 people with three in sales. 1.5 years later, Yokoy finished series A and employs more than 100 people, 40 of which are in Lars' team. Learn how he managed to grow his team so fast and what tactics they are using to win customers every day.
You do not want to be ghosted again? Then, this episode is for you. James 'saywhatsales' Buckley is currently Chief Evangelist & Master of Ceremonies @ JB Sales and definitely earned his evangelist title. One can literally feel his energy and he has a lot of interesting tactical tips to share for all the salespeople who do regular demos and have difficulty following up with potential clients. Happy learning and let us know your feedback.
Focusing on customer acquisition in a startup is crucial.
But you need to stop flying blind on existing customers.
Because Customer Success only works if you commit to understand, plan & implement.
Here are 3 steps to execute on this I learned from Valentina:
1️⃣ Understand: Start with a Status Quo Assessment.
You need to understand the challenges and what works before you can improve.
Focus on people, technology, strategy and processes.
Stop flying blind and start making decisions based on data.
2️⃣ Plan: Craft a vision for Customer Success as a company.
Dig deeper on the customer journey phases, visualize them and share with the team and customers.
Be honest about what does not work. And how to fix it.
“Hustling” is not the answer. Industrialise & automate where you can.
Mattia is working as an SDR for Salesloft in the DACH market and consistently reached her target last year. Considering the person you need to get the attention of is the VP of Sales or CSO, that is not easy. They not only know all the tricks salespeople apply but also are targeted by more salespeople than others. How you get the attention of busy personas and why video messaging alone is not enough you learn in this episode.
Rouven built sales at bexio and is now leading marketing, customer success and sales. He has some ideas on how to align marketing and sales and even more importantly improve his organisation through constant testing. The salespeople for instance are testing at least 3 hypotheses every year. It is one of their Key results. How such a test can look like, you will be hearing from Rouven in this episode. Happy learning!
Stephan is leading a sales team of 50+ sellers in 13 European countries. There are huge cultural differences in those countries but one thing he finds important for everybody: Focus on those activities that have the most impact. He thinks salespeople should spend time thinking about their approach and targets so that they have maximum impact. How to do that? Listen in.
Michael faced and survived a really difficult illness a few years ago - and got out more conscious of life in general and what you need to live a happy and fulfilling life. Patrick and Michael talk about that experience and what five aspects of life you need to care about.
Yokoy is on a mission - and on track - to become a FinTech unicorn.
This means growing from 50 to 250 people in record time.
Ben Bauer leads the way for DE, building his team from scratch to 30+ reps quickly.
Here are 3 things I learnt from Ben:
1️⃣ 1% bad gut feeling is 100% no in talent acquisition.
Ben only hires sales talent where his gut feelling is a 100% yes.
Even under high pressure to staff open positions quickly.
Because hiring talent that is not a fit is just too expensive.
Even if they have a stellar track record from Salesforce or Google.
2️⃣ Friendly competitive tag teams are great.
Ben currently builds SDR x AE tag teams per region.
This means 0 direct competition on target customers.
But also a natural performance-oriented contest of who does best.
3️⃣ Why Ben “joined the dark side”.
He started out in marketing but loves “being on the frontline”.
Still reading lots of psychological books like Never Split the Difference.
But applying the gained knowledge in synchronous communication.
salessuccess #startupsales #entrepreneurship #startup #salesplaybook
People use a lot of phrases and terms nobody really understands in sales - it can be highly confusing. That is detrimental for salespeople because they need to know how to communicate with their prospects. People who have never heard about them before. Patrick only understood many of these terms very late in his career and that is why he wants to make them available for others earlier. Happy learning!
This is Patrick's third session (after the discovery call and cold call sessions) in which he talks about what he thinks a pitch should consist of and how you tackle these two situations: The "give me your pitch" and the "long pitch after a discovery" situations. You will get applicable techniques you can use right away and apply to your product or service.
Guillaume Moubeche is a true legend in B2B SaaS Sales.
Not only did he scale lemlist $10M ARR in <4 years.
He also did so with 0 external capital & stayed incredibly humble.
I am incredibly grateful for having him on our B2B Podcast recently.
Here are the 3 things from Guillaume that impressed me the most:
1️⃣ His mindset on sales Sales is all about
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Building human relationships,
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Helping people solve problems and
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Impacting a million lives.
NOT money, NOT fame, NOT ego.
2️⃣ His humble hustling spirit: Guillaume just cashed out $10 million
At a lemlist valuation of $150 million.
He does not need to work anymore.
But he does.
To positively impact 1’000’000 entrepreneurs.
So he keeps building, networking, learning and paying forward every day.
3️⃣ His beginner’s mind: He still has 5-10 conversations with peers per week.
With CEOs of 100M+ ARR companies.
But also founders who are just starting out.
He is learning from everybody, with 0 ego on what he achieved.
Guillaume, it was a true honor to “share the mic” with you - stay awesome!
Stay true to your pipeline and yourself in sales.
Simple to say, not easy to do, but so important.
Was a true pleasure learning from Pascal van Dalen recently.
👉Here are 3 best things I learnt from him on our podcast
1️⃣ Focus on conversations, not pitches
The dialogue with your customer shifts if you listen.
Learn & understand first, create a pull effect, then help.
Sales is about helping people solve problems, NOT money.
2️⃣ Empathy is key for sales leaders
“Managing out of the book” is challenging, if not wrong.
Sales leaders need to close deals first themselves.
Because they otherwise do not truly understand.
3️⃣ Bring the message forward & keep learning
Pascal - still, after 10+ years in B2B SaaS Sales loves learning.
And bringing in what he learned as VP Sales to fast-growing startups.
Focusing on making his team successful.
👉 How do you see sales leadership?
Andrei and Patrick talk about the six principles that help you become a company that is literally generating demand. Andrei first worked more than 5 years in sales and then got into marketing before he started and grew his own company. He walks the talk and has more than 13k followers on LinkedIn today.
From Principle Consultant to CEO, Bernd Schopp built Namics into a company with more than 600 people over 19 years. Recently he started as CCO at Squirro, one of the most promising Swiss Scale-ups. The big difference? In contrast to selling professional services, Bernd now sells a product. Bernd and Patrick have a discussion that might be interesting not only for all those who sell consulting services but also for those product guys who truly want to become a unicorn.
Winning by Design helped transform SaaS sales "from art to science".
Yes, there might be some competitive overlap with SalesPlaybook.
Collaboration before competition is a core value - which Harold shares.
It was a true pleasure learning from him on our podcast.
Here are the 3 key insights I took from sharing the mic with him:
1️⃣ Storytelling is key:
“Sales is a numbers game”. OK, but well…
People take decisions emotionally, and then justify them rationally.
Get a clear framework for the story you tell. Then tailor it.
2️⃣ Why multi-threading is so important:
Winning a 100k deal involves typically 5-10 stakeholders.
You can simply not afford to rely only on 1-2 people to “make it happen”.
Which is why “spinning multiple threads” early on is crucial.
3️⃣ “Content is King”: Content Marketing is Winning by Design’s main lead source.
Because they share often, early and most important ly freely.
Harold & his team love providing tons of value.
People who get value will pay you once they want even more value
Thanks a lot Harold for your time & insights and looking forward to by design (pun intended) collaborate on some European B2B SaaS scaleups in 2022!
Customer referrals & partnerships are one of the most underrated sales channels to scale revenue quickly - if done right!
👉Here are 3 things I learnt from Werner Decker on our podcast
1️⃣ Frame & ask for referrals early: Ask customer even before offer signature if they would be OK with you asking for 3-5 warm introductions - once you deliver on what you promise indeed.
2️⃣ Seek discomfort: Get over your anxiety and inertia to ask for an introduction, to cope with awkward silence - and to do so consistently.
3️⃣ Growth mindset: Successful partnerships require you to embody a growth mindset, maximising the "What's in for me?" for partners, NOT cost saving strategies. An example how he implemented this with a client is to keep things really simple: "If your referral signs, we pay you EUR 12k, cash, within 30 days - no % calculation, no further conditionality. (Average Contract Value was 80-100k ARR, really low churn)
How do you tackle referrals?
Christian Weisbrodt is one of the most knowledgeable marketing leaders in Europe. He has been working for Microsoft, headed Marketing at Personio, and is now CRO at Finway. He knows what is needed to perfectly align the goals of marketing and sales and also what KPIs to use. We talk about how to define MQLs, SQLs and other variables that will help you get things right early in your go-to-market strategy
Robert has more than 20 years of experience in B2B sales and is leading a team of more than 30 marketers and salespeople today. In this episode, Patrick and Robert talk about negotiation and building the pipeline. Robert strongly believes that building your pipeline is the most important activity of salespeople.
Philip is a rare breed in Europe. There are not yet many SDR leaders in Europe who know the ins and outs of outbound prospecting. After 2 min of listening to Philip, you will understand why he is training dozens of SDRs and helps all of them to become more successful. You will get a new way to handle the gatekeeper (I never heard of that technique myself!), a better way to get direct phone numbers and a technique that helps you land the next meeting. Check out his blog: bstsllr.de
Robin Schmidt built his way into cold emailing after finding out that paid advertisement works for his clients, but not his own business.
He now helps German B2B SaaS businesses setup cold email marketing at scale, aiming for 1-3% booking rates while complying with DSGVO.
Ian Koniak has over $100 million in career sales and numerous finishes at #1 nationally, including finishing #1 in the US Enterprise Select Division of Salesforce on his belt.
However, he sees a gap in coaching & training how to lead a sales life with integrity...
👉 Here are 3 actionable insights I got from him on our podcast
1️⃣ Know your numbers: “Schedule 2 appointments and do 2 appointments every day and you will be fine. That’s 40 appointments per month, if you close 25% of them that’s 10 deals. 10 deals of 4k each means you contribute 40k in new business every month.”
Ian did this for the better part of a decade selling copiers. But quickly doubling deal size...
2️⃣ Sell to executives: Ian evolved to a sales director selling 1M in 3 months by selling to fewer customers, but helping to solve business priorities “higher up”.
3️⃣ Prospect yourself in ABS (Account-Based Selling): It is the job of the sales executive to do research, reach out, orchestrate the buyer journey and more on strategic accounts.
Thanks again for sharing this Ian and all the best for your new own company!
Karol is a true cold call wizard who started in a B2C company with which he sold telecommunication subscriptions to consumers, and then transferred to B2B because it was easier. Many people he called actually hung up on him immediately. He knows how to talk to people on a call and how to keep them engaged.
Patrick has done hundreds of discovery calls with customers with less than 20% talking time. Most salespeople struggle with asking the right and deepening questions and really find the meat on the bone. After listening to this episode, you will have learned several techniques that help you have better conversations with your prospect. For once, Patrick is a guest rather than the host - interviewed by Manuel.
Our Co-Host Manuel Hartmann is tested for his tactical knowledge - and withstands. If you want to learn how to finally send every follow-up as a video and how to actually get rid of the follow-ups completely, listen to this episode. Manuel and Patrick are interviewing each other for once.
Was haben grüne Bananen mit LinkedIn zu tun?
Die meisten Deiner Zielkunden sind noch nicht “reif zum kaufen” - aber schätzen Mehrwert.
Professionelles Lead Nurturing wird immer wichtiger. Die Tools gibt es, Wissen ist oft rar.
👉Hier sind 3 Dinge, die ich von Susann lernen durfte in unserem Podcast
(Link zur Episode im 1. Kommentar):
1️⃣ Mehrwert ist ein Muss: Niemand “tauscht ”seine Email-Adresse mehr für einen 1-Pager. Whitepaper, Reports und Case Studies müssen inhaltlich wertvoll sein.
2️⃣ Smarketing: Sales & Marketing müssen eng zusammenarbeiten. SDRs sind bei DRACOON im Marketing angesiedelt, Marketing-Mitarbeiter oft in Sales Calls dabei.
3️⃣Vernetzung hilft: Wir haben alle Tools, Plattformen und Podcasts um voneinander zu lernen. Wir müssen es nur tun, die Chancen dafür sind riesig!
P.S. Dracoon is hiring BDRs and Susann has some capacity on Fridays’ to help you as a “CMO as a service”...
Patrick and I told Dominik he cannot lose a single client building customer success at LARI.
He did not - which is truly amazing over nearly 2 years, while going 3x ARR in that time.
Customer Success (CS) is still a young discipline in Europe & it was great to learn from him.
👉Here are 3 things I learnt from Dominik on our podcast (full episode in 1st comment):
1️⃣ Stay close to your customers: Domink & his team have regular conversations with all their existing customers, no matter how small to drive 100%(+) Net Revenue Retention.
2️⃣ Few CS Experts: Customer Success is still a young discipline in Europe with few people who “have been there, done that”. Talent, Curiosity & Hunger seem therefore more important than experience here.
3️⃣CS is a profit center: Like sales, Customer Success exists to drive revenue.
Dominik loves to work in a function where he exists to increase ARR instead of saving costs.
P.S. LARI is hiring a Customer Success Manager for Suisse Romandie...
No upfront cost. Unlimited income potential. Absolutely love this tagline from Uvaro.
Sales Talent Acquisition is one of the biggest challenges of B2B Startups as I see it.
There are simply not enough great sales people available on the market.
👉Here are 3 things I learnt from Joseph Fung on our podcast (full episode in 1st comment):
1️⃣ Empathy is everything: B2B Tech Sales is a lot about the ability to listen actively.
About the consistency to understand, help and communicate with customers, NOT pitching.
2️⃣ Capabilities & Experience transfer: Empathy is independent of B2BTech.
(Former) Barkeepers, nurses, chefs, flight attendants are crushing their quotas by 2-3.5x.
3️⃣ A safe environment is key: People need practice & actionable feedback, like athletes.
Having them watching videos, throwing them in the field & shouting “sell more” doesn’t cut it.
I also love Joseph’s urgent curiosity to learn from others and staying so humble as a serial entrepreneur and just raising a $12 million Series A.
Shout-out to Joseph & Team for helping to add talent to the B2B Tech salesforce!
P.S. And yes, we’re thinking about how to best partner up re North America x Europe ;-)
Hendrik has led and grown his sales team at adjust.com to over 100 salespeople. Most impressively, during his time, he lost only two of his whole team. He knows exactly how a hiring process should look like, what questions to ask, and what needs to be done so that candidates do not say what we want to hear but rather who they really are. That is exactly what we cover in this episode with Patrick, CSO Unique.
Video is the future of sales. For prospecting, for building trust, for more pleasant sales.
But having meaningful video conversations at scale are “a beast”.
Tolstoy is bridging the gap between authentic conversation and robust scalabability
Here’s 3 takeaways from Dov on “Sales for Video 2.0”:
1️⃣Video is about making sales human: No make-up, script, perfection required
2️⃣Conversational Video: “Videobots” help to have a dialogue instead of just a “movie”
3️⃣Ongoing dialogue: Flexibility is power to build Mutual Action Plans, Q&A & more.
Also love Dov’s “value-first” mindset of building longer-term relationships first.
Shout-out also to Thibaut for sharing “the latest and greatest” on prospecting trends.
You nudged me to connect with Dov - keep up the amazing work!
Frank, der Gründer von "FoxCast", hat wertvolle Erfahrungen in Sales und Marketing und weiss ganz genau wo die Probleme und Lösungen in der Zusammenarbeit dieser zwei Abteilungen liegen. Wie und wo Ihr Eure B2B Buyer ansprecht, weshalb das Pferd nicht die Zukunft war, und der Umstieg auf einen Webshop nach 1999 keinen Sinn gemacht hat, erfahrt Ihr in dieser Folge. Ausserdem sprechen wir über die Amerikanische Vorgehensweise über Angst zu verkaufen und wie das in Europa ankommt.
Sebastian Oetzel, Head of Sales Field Services bei der LMIS AG ist einer der talentiertesten Storyteller, dem wir je begegnet sind. Er erzählt, wie er die potenziellen Kunden in den ersten Sekunden eines Gesprächs zum lachen bringt und wir er mit einer persönlichen Story an den Gatekeeper vorbei kommt. Überzeuge Dich selber von Sebastian's Talent und schaue Ihm seine zwei besten Tricks direkt ab.
Katrin Brugger ist seit über 10 Jahren im BtoB Sales unterwegs (wie auch als Co-Pilotin im Profi Rally Sport) und hat schon unterschiedliche und vor allem auch konservative Unternehmenskulturen erlebt - das ging so weit, dass Sales Leute Ihre Kontakte nicht teilen oder ins CRM eintragen wollten. Aus Angst das Wissen an die Kollegen weiter zu geben und damit selber weniger wert zu sein. Wie sie mit solchen Situationen umgegangen ist und was sie von Cold Calling hält, hört Ihr in dieser Episode moderiert von Patrick, CSO Unique
Thomas has built up a team of 18 SDRs in the past two years. He shares his two absolute favourite tips when it comes to selling as well as his favourite outbound tactics and sequences. For (aspiring) sales leaders, we are also talking about the difficulties to hire and training an SDR team remotely.
In case somebody approaches us with a problem, we talk about a solution way too quickly. In sales as well as relationships. Katharina and Patrick talk about the GROW model, with which in mind you will become better at asking questions. The model, originally from coaching, will help you arrange the thoughts and find question. We are role playing a situation as well as talk about how to write a closing plan after the customer agreed on a solution. Have fun and we are looking forward to receiving your feedback.
Imagine you have no product to sell yet and have to get into a first call with your customer. What do you do? Patrick and Alexis are playing a prospect interaction - Patrick is the salesperson and Alexis the customer. The Unique product is just about to be released and both have not talked too many prospects yet. Listen in to learn how to structure your first call and really get to the bone of the meat with the right discovery questions at the right time
Right after the start, Gerke is sharing his two tactical tips you as a salesperson can use immediately thereafter. It is about getting more information on prospects you do not reach and properly follow-up. As Gerke hired a significant number of salespeople the past 6 months, he is also sharing concrete exercises to do and questions to ask during the hiring process.
Many salespeople focus on the wrong opportunities and keep spending time with people who do not want to buy. That is why Nicholas and Patrick talk about Nicholas' approach to focus and qualification early in the sales process. The second main topic of this episode is cold calling. Ho do you prepare and launch a cold call? What mindset do you need? Listen in and give us some feedback. If you want to check out: noCRM.io
Jake Dunlap is a leader in the Sales Enablement space I’ve been following for the last 18 months. He overachieved my already high expectations as a guest for our B2B Startup Sales Podcast. Let me share 3 arguments why.
Humble Hustling: He built Skaled from the ground up to $5M annual revenue with 0 external funding. After he scaled Glassdoor’s sales team from 1 to 30+ people and $1M M!(R)R in 12 months. He made 0 fuzz about these achievements, but focused on providing value to the audience.
Value before price: Even if he surely could, their first call with prospects is all about discovery, being helpful and understanding if they could be more helpful. NOT about a 0 value-adding “interrogation” of generic qualifications.
Collaboration before Competition: We are actually quite excited about the potential of expanding our footprint to help our clients in their go-to-market Europe (SalesPlaybook <-> North America (Skaled).
David joined Byrd as a VP of Sales rigt before the corona crisis. He managed to build and develop a great sales team that was able to grow revenue by more than 300%. What exactly he has done to achieve those amazing results, you will hear in this episode with Patrick.
Boyke has been into sales for the past 25 years. The sales profession changed a lot during that time, and Boyke grew with it. He is a firm believer in value selling and knows what questions to ask at what time in the sales cycle. You will hear a lot of examples you can use directly for your own calls.
“We will help you to double your revenue in 90 days” sounds a lot like clickbait.
Having Simon Severino from Strategysprints on the podcast was however a true pleasure as he shares our mindset of “playing long-term games with long-term people”.
Here are 3 things we learnt from the conversation with him:
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Referral Teams require mutual commitment: He built a JVC - a Joint Venture Club to institutionalise who does what in what rhythm to make sure things actually happen and make referrals (more) predictable.
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Lifetime Referral Fees: He embraces a 20% lifetime referral fee - which investors typically hate - with a pure-play mindset of "making a bigger cake" and building trusted, long-term partnerships and even friendships.
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Move "2 levels above fulfilment": A founder needs to work more ON the business than IN the business and remove herself from operations.
Saša is a passionate salesman. One can definitely feel that from the way he speaks about such topics as "pitching", "resilience" and "persistence". You can put more pressure on your prospects than you think. How you do that? We guess you have to listen to learn that :)
Timo and Patrick talk about Timo's journey at Jobmatch.me when he joined the startup 1.5 years ago. The company made a shift from sales-led to product-led growth and at the same time, Timo had to build up a well-oiled sales team that can follow-up with leads from the free trial as well as are able to reach out cold to the most important accounts. If you want to know what it takes to build a team that wants to work together every day, listen to that episode.
Daniel worked for all the well-known companies in the tech industry: Microsoft, IBM, AWS, SAP, Gartner and recently became the Manager of the Enterprise Sales Teams in Switzerland and Austria for Zoom. Daniel and Patrick talk about his approach to defining an ICP and focus the sales team on the best opportunities, what difference to expect when selling to large corporation and how to reach out to prospects with those restrictive data protection laws in Europe.
Finn Thormeier claims to still have no clue about life after just turning 25. We heartily disagree and think he has more clues about life than 99% of 25-year olds. Especially about creating consistency in video content creation and publishing.
Stephanie Biebel and Manuel discuss with Finn about different ideation and content creation strategies and mindsets, but also the variable effort behind what it takes to publish attractive content consistently.
Aaron Ross is one of the true grandmasters of B2B Outbound Sales after building it up at Salesforce, writing Predictable Revenue and Impossible to Inevitable and more than a decade helping sales teams coach and build SDR teams.
Here are 3 things among the many more I learnt from him:
1) "Done for You" is not a silver bullet: Predictable Revenue offers both "teaching you how to fish" and "going fishing for you", but running both at the same time is hard. Also, it is a lot about expectation management.
2) Western Europe is still attractive for cold outbound: Applying state-of-the-art cold email outbound practices in the US yields <5% reply rates at scale. Applying similar practices in Europe, especially in Switzerland / DACH can get you to 20-40% reply rates quickly as the market is less mature (or crowded by 8-12 step sequences from Sales "Engagement" software).
3) A players (like Aaron) want human conversations: More Slack channels, virtual conferences and Q&A forums are not solving the puzzle of building a trusted, connected, flexible B2B Sales Acceleration partner ecosystem. Travel to meet physically is a challenge, but desirable for dedicated meetups. Until then small 2-5 people Zoom "Fireside Chats" can help.
The other not B2B sales-related feat which I find even more impressive than his sales track record is that Aaron takes care of his 9 kids as an actual father by limiting himself to 20 hours for (the better part of) the last decade, currently also across the ocean between Los Angeles and the UK.
One of the most underestimated assets you have as a company is the value you can bring to your customers not only with the product but also with a sophisticated sales process and well-trained and knowledgable salespeople. Your reps need to be in a mindset to be useful to your prospects and customers.
Are you looking for sales tips you can apply immediately? Then this is series for you. Markus Eilers and Patrick Trümpi talk about the 5th commandment in sales: Be useful first!
Patrick and I loved interviewing 50+ sales leaders for our B2B Startup Sales podcast.
But we honestly never imagined to build a demand generation business out of it.
Mark did so very successfully with Speak on Podcasts to help B2B Tech Brands increase brand awareness and generate more demand by speaking on podcasts your audience listens to and trusts.
After spending 12 years in B2B sales, marketing and recruiting, Mark and I talked about the value of having conversations instead of pitches, always be connecting and why cold email is not dead at all.
Here are 3 things among the many more I learnt from him:
- Always be closing is dead. It’s 2021 and ABC means always be connecting as the new decade is all about building long-term, trusted relationships, resulting in increased customer lifetime value, referrals, case studies and more
- 60% reply rates on cold email are still possible...if you invest the time, focus and energy to personalise your messaging and connect with human beings instead of just “spray & pray” 8-12 step sequences
- Sales is about having two-way conversations and not a sales person pitching. Enough said on that (Elephants vs Lions anybody?)
Silvan successfully founded and sold GymHopper cold-calling independent gyms and closing deals quickly.
He then moved on to sell 6-figure deals for RenTouch 100% remote from Switzerland to +/- 50% US customers.
He also interviewed 150+ Swiss entrepreneurs on the Swisspreneurs podcast and shares with us his insights he gained from successful entrepreneurs such as Ariel Lüdi and Tobias Häckermann.
Simon and Patrick talk about the nine stages in Simon's sales process that help you to categorise your Leads/Opportunities to get your prospects through the funnel and engage with them the right way at the right time. Simon has been in sales for more than 18 years and loves the profession. You can feel that with every word that crosses Simon's lips.
Julius Göllner was at Zalando while the company was growing from roughly 200 to 10’000 employees and since then founded, advised and invested in multiple B2B SaaS companies himself.
Here’s 3 things we learnt from him:
Sales coaching is crucial for a sales team’s success, but the DACH market is quite intransparent on what’s worth investing in.
Founders are often not 100% clear on what they require at which stage regarding product-market-fit, hiring sales talent and how to sell to which buyer personas.
Figured out sales is a lot about cooperation and long-term trusted relationships and not living an “Ellbogenmentalität” as many people believe (and would have loved to know this at 20 years old already).
Dan Englander is doing truly impressive work on finding a fine line between personalization and scale in outbound sales.
We talked with him about how to execute relationship-based sales at scale, why most sales people fail due to inconsistency and also how email is still the most anti-fragile sales channel in today's noisy world.
Hosting an online summit is one of the smartest growth strategies and lead generation tools on the market today.
In this session, Natalie shares step by step how you can organise an online summit for your SaaS to promote your thought leadership, grow your email list, build partnerships while generating a year's worth of content.
Besides that, we talk about how to validate an idea with first paying customers before building and failing in months instead of years.
You start to hire. You want experts – sales talents with experience. They will reduce your effort and increase revenue at the same time. They know how to sell, right? And there the problems start.
This myth is very common in growing organizations. And that’s in a lot of cases the reason why the growth is slowing down or even stopping. It’s like hiring an expensive player for your football team and expecting him to train himself.
Which is why we wanted to learn from Alen why it is worth the investment to move to “ABC² -> “Always be coaching” if you want to “always be closing”.
Engineers usually underestimate the importance of selling after they built their first product. Andrea and Patrick talk about Andrea's experience in sales after he got into the profession with a master's degree in physics.
Jonas and Patrick are talking about techniques that will help you get into a cold call with the right mindset, and use the right tricks to get that person on the phone you actually want to.
We got the following learnings from that episode: First, collateral, fact sheets, and other sales tools can actually become crutches that actually make salespeople less effective. This is also why Ryan wrote a book called "Naked Selling", convinced that the most natural sale can and often does happen with 0 technical aid. Secondly, Salespeople often start pitching way too early. As they don't understand the prospect's problem well enough, they fail to craft a compelling story and build enough trust to successfully sell. Thirdly, ongoing sales coaching is better than one-off sales training. People benefit from accountability over time instead of a single "motivation shot".
Are you looking for sales tips you can apply immediately? Then this is for you. Markus Eilers and Patrick Trümpi talk about the 4th commandment in sales: "Become a student of your customer"
After his studies at University St. Gallen, Enzo went into sales at the large corporate Hilti. What he learned about sales and why he has not yet transferred to a startup, you can learn in this episode.
3 things we learnt from him:
1) Focus on customer success: Selling is not about the product. Every HILTI sales person spends several months, typically more in field sales, being on construction sites, talking to real customers every week.
2) Empower champions, understand skeptics: Help positive, high-energy change agents “spread the love” with success stories, but also be open and transparent to understand negative emotions to not derail an initiative.
3) Sales is about listening, not pushing: Learning sales is helpful for any professional, but the perception from “the pushy car sales guy” still needs to change in Switzerland. Once it does, this shall get more people into sales.
Are you looking for sales tips you can apply immediately? Then this is for you. Markus Eilers and Patrick Trümpi talk about the 3rd commandment in sales: "Pick a fight" - which basically means that you have to choose your niche before you get selling going. How and why you can do that, we explain in this episode.
Mathijs started and built up the branch in the Netherlands for Vainu. In this episode, you learn about his journey and how he is setting goals, measures success, and incentivizes his sales and customer success teams.
Cold Calling is really tough. At least that is what Patrick thought five years ago, a time he has not practiced cold calling almost every day. Much is about how you approach it and with what mindset you go into a cold call. In this episode, Patrick talks about principles in cold calling, shows simple techniques on how to launch a call, handle objections and build raport - and how not to mess up.
Finn, 24, has built up a large LinkedIn audience over the past two years and is now helping CEOs of Startups to build their own. In this episode, he explains why posting valuable stuff is much more important than engagement engineering (or: playing with people's emotional triggers to generate followers) when we look into such variables as "generated leads" or "revenue" and why he is not wasting time convincing people to start themselves who have not bought into the idea yet.
Yaël and Jo started their own agency in their early twenties. They knew what problem they wanted to solve but did not exactly know how exactly they can achieve this. As Simon Sinek taught us, the "why" is more important than the "how". In his episode, you learn about their impressive journey and might be inspired by what they have achieved at a very young age.
Are you familiar with this problem: You are reaching out to prospects (cold email, call, or LinkedIn) and booked the first meeting with them, and they almost always come to that meeting "wanting to hear about your product and what you can do for them?" Most salespeople struggle to really have their prospects do most of the talking in those first meetings. In this special episode, Patrick Trümpi (CSO LARI) is sharing tactical advice on how to increase the time your prospects talk and, thus, make that time most valuable for both, the sales and the prospect.
"The best CRM user is often the worst-performing sales rep" is an extreme quote from a VP Sales we know.
But the reality is, CRM adoption is an issue most, if not all entrepreneurs struggle with to get value from technology and not only wasted efforts.
3 things we learnt from Jeroen Corthout, Co-Founder of Salesflare are
1️⃣ Don't over-integrate: No-code, vendor-agnostic solutions like Zapier can often help you setup workflows and transparency quicker, easier, at a lower investment than (over-)paying for Enterprise / Ultimate editions from established CRM providers.
2️⃣ Confidence is king: Many sales people seem to talk more than they listen because they are not confident enough to ask questions or "lose the deal by not selling enough".
3️⃣ Product-led-growth works!: After 2-3 years of founder-led sales, Jeroen managed to build Salesflare to 2'000+ customers mainly via product-led- growth. Still today, he only has 1 other sales person besides him getting customers.
In this episode, Andrew and Patrick talk about how Andrew supports Startups with their marketing activities - with a focus on data-driven decision making.
How to balance automation vs personalisation in lead generation. An interesting trend we see is that people like Max Romanchuk from https://leadgen-close.com/ with a ton of automation go back to (hyper-)personalisation.
3 things that we learnt from him:
1️⃣ Outbound lead gen is very local: Things that work in the US don’t work in Western Europe and vice versa. Also, database-based automation options (say Apollo.io) are great for non-GDPR geographies, but should be avoided
2️⃣ Stop selling, start having a conversation: Automation via Dux Soup, snov.io etc. has its charms. But salespeople should use technology wisely not to pitch, but to open a personal dialogue based on great prospecting
3️⃣ Commitment is a two-way street: Max experimented with commission-only collaborations, but noticed also clients were less committed to put in the required work to succeed
In case you are planning to build a fast-growing startup and need some advice on how to structure your sales organization and what metrics (in and out) to use, this episode is for you. Björn built Urbansports from 5 to 50 salespeople within 24 months. An amazing achievement. You can probably learn from him - as we could as well.
Finding, attracting and ramping sales talent as an entrepreneur is really hard.
Turns out the root cause for this is not the above task, but the shortage of overall available trained sales talent in relation to demand.
Dominic co-founded https://www.headstartacademy.co/ to tackle exactly this problem and these are 3 things that we learnt from him:
1️⃣ Great sales talent shares 5 traits: coachability, curiosity, drive, resilience and prior success. These do NOT need to be sales-related, but e.g. top 1% of class, in sports, in vocational training or similar (Source: Dominic & Team interviewed 50+ VP Sales)
2️⃣ Both self-care in terms of discipline, self-organisation and hunger COMBINED with a strong team spirit is crucial for success
3️⃣ Entrepreneurs need to validate their sales approach themselves by winning the first 10, in some fields even 100 customers, and that cannot be outsourced. Only once product-market-fit is there, it makes sense to get senior, but hungry sales talent - if you can afford it and de-risk it. Otherwise invest into junior, but trained sales talent.
Garrett Jackson won our unofficial "LinkedIn Cold Outreach Award of 2020"...but does not consider himself a sales person!?
3 things that we learnt from him:
1️⃣ Vary your messaging: Be very aware on the impact of your marketing. Broadcasting the same single ad to a person too many times can even result in bad Google Reviews because people appreciate variety and added value. (5')
2️⃣ Invest into customers: Garrett focuses on over-deliver on great service to clients (we can confirm) but not overcharging to establish long-term relationships (9')
3️⃣Focus on hands-on execution, but invest into technology: Don't overthink things and stay hands-on on the human side, but also be aware where technology can help you automate your outreach. (16')
Was a true pleasure to discuss B2B startup sales with Helmut Käser who leads SMB sales for Avrios and why "stop selling, start solving problems for customers" matters to him.
3 things that we learnt from him:
1️⃣ "Nature vs Nurture" in sales: Talent is great, but without training you will not become an outstanding professional - be it in sports, be it in sales. The process can be learnt, but a well-developed "sensory system" in client interactions, especially remote are soft factors. (5')
2️⃣ Start...and continue with WHY: Sales people often jump to quickly into "closing mode" and don't dig deep enough into WHY a prospect is doing or thinking a certain why. It is totally worth it to ask Why even 10 times to better understand the situation (12')
3️⃣Be patient but persistent: Helmut is very fond of taking the speed out of the process, let it grow and adapt but then follow-through and do it properly (21')
Are you looking for sales tips that help you gain an unfair advantage? In that case, this series is for you. Markus Eilers and Patrick Trümpi talk about the 2nd commandment in sales: "Win before the battle" (Sun Tzu) - why and how to prepare for a sales call. Following that advice may increase your sales success more than 2-fold. Have fun and give us some feedback.
James is an expert in Marketing and Sales. We talk about how to make the best out of both worlds to help your company grow. Additionally, we embrace to use speers when it comes to outbound BtoB sales and tell you the reasons behind this. It will automatically make the sales and buyer journey more human - which is really necessary.
True pleasure discussing how to improve sales demos, tackle sales hiring and onboarding and more with Robert Anders, VP Sales Services at Cremanski and former Head of Sales at Comtravo.
3 things that we learnt from him:
1️⃣ Sales is about interaction: A company he advises is called Demodesk, but out of a 30min "demo" call, only the "middle" 5-10min should be about your solution while the time before is spent on discovery & qualification and the time after to define the further process. (7')
2️⃣ Hire two sales reps at a time: Hiring 2 SDRs (Sales Development Reps) at the same time can help to not only set expectations, but also compare performance while performing the same role (18')
3️⃣ How to assess coachability: Let them pitch, give constructive feedback, ask for self-diagnosis, go again and assess improvements. Quite simple, but powerful (24')
Are you looking for sales tips that give you an unfair advantage? Then this is for you. Markus Eilers and Patrick Trümpi talk about the 1st commandment in sales: "you should have a "why" sooooo big that any "how" will surrender". Following that advice may improve your mindset and sales success immediately. Have fun and give us some feedback.
Was a true pleasure to discuss B2B SaaS Scaleup sales with Fredrik Ström who before coaching entrepreneurs at Plug and Play Tech Center helped Dataiku in enterprise sales to hit a $2.8B valuation.
3 things that we learnt from him:
1️⃣ Enter the client's world: Empathy and active listening are are essential to understand how clients understand, evaluate and buy in THEIR world, instead of trying to "map" them onto your sales process, deal stages or similar
2️⃣ Selling is learning. The co-founder & CEO needs to remain close to customers to learn quick enough and feed back these insights to enable quick but efficient growth
3️⃣Unlearning takes time: Fredrik favours hiring younger sales people as experienced reps often need to unlearn certain behaviors or change the mindset into a completely new sales approach.
Here are a few take-aways from the discussion with Steven:
- Founder-led growth is exciting but many startups rush into scaling and struggle with the initial motion. "From impossible to inevitable" is an amazing book that helps avoid many struggles founders have with early sales.
- When he joined Interseller, the first thing Steven did is raise the price. Because the founders got into "fighting for price". He promised to keep the closing rates - and was successful. Focus on driving one metric after another.
- Even if you have a really good and easy-to-use tool, you may want to go with sales-led instead of product-led growth at the beginning. That is what Inerseller was doing, after an unsuccessful focus on product-led growth. You can learn your customer's pains best with a good discovery and adapt your messaging to these. The impact on adaptation is huge.
- If you want to improve your Prospecting capabilities, Becc Holland is an expert you want to follow and learn from
Have fun and please provide some feedback.
We had the pleasure of learning from a great Sales Leader with Julian Jobstreibizer who helps to build sales at UiPath in Switzerland.
3 things that we learnt from him
1️⃣ The vision of the CEO or Sales Leader and the ability to get people to buy into this is essential to retain great sales talent. Great sales people want to get paid, but money is not the primary driver. (2’)
2️⃣ You’re always selling, no matter what. If the CEO does not connect to sales, he or she does not connect to the customer. (5’)
3️⃣You need to work hard TO party hard. Start small, keep it simple, focus on value, become a trusted advisor. This will generate the best referrals, revenue growth and more. (20)
We all struggle with prospecting. What are the right tools? The right messages? Are there cultural differences among countries? How do I increase the likelihood of being heard significantly? With Philipp from ComX, a company that provides outreach for a lot KMUs as a service, we are talking about the big struggles in prospecting and how you can better predict the outcome of your messages.
Learn from a true Sales Leader with Sam from https://www.samsalesconsulting.com/ who built an all-female salesforce (not even by design) and a “BDR as a Service” offering + a helpdesk for clients’ BDRs.
4 things to be learnt from her
1️⃣ LinkedIn is still people-rich, but content-poor. Personalisation when reaching out to people with an authentic desire to help still matters - a lot. And no “More sales, less time, mutual connections” is not working (anymore). (5’)
2️⃣ Why a BDR hotline makes sense. “Delegating” daily Q&A of regular BDR (Business Development Representative) questions to a “helpdesk” in a subscription model can be highly useful for a busy CEOs / VP Sales. (10’)
3️⃣Hourly Rates: It is truly a matter of demand and supply. Sam raised her hourly rate from $200ish / h to currently >$600 to make sure she spends time on high-leverage activities.
4️⃣Sam built an all-female salesforce (which at least I’ve never encountered before). Empowering and supporting more women to go into sales is a leadership responsibility.
This is about learning from a true Procurement Leader with Christoph - who started his career in sales and since then “moved between both worlds” intensely over the last 15 years
3 things to be learnt from Christoph
1️⃣ “Procuring is necessary, (Traditional) Procurements is not”: Professionals buy digitally for even 7-digit amounts and procurement people need to move towards providing solution and a consulting role (3’)
2️⃣ Less than 1(!) out 10 people typically ask Christoph about his internal buyer journey. Dear sales people, please strive to understand before wanting to be understood - people like Christoph are more than happy to help you sell - if you ask! (5’ + ongoing)
3️⃣ Sales is not a “one-time-thing”, but should be - especially in DACH - an activity of continuous value creation for the client. Culture matters (so much) in sales - North America might be a few years ahead in regards to technology, but DACH requires a local approach to succeed. (28’)
"How to find, attract and retain great B2B Tech Sales Talent without paying CHF 150-300k per year?"
The root cause of extraordinarily high salaries for sales people in DACH might actually be a lack of "talent supply"...due to a lack of sales culture + education...
We had the pleasure of learning from one Switzerland’s best growth hackers with Joel Capt, who built up the growth team at Beekeeper and just launched his own market offering in the space.
2 things that we learnt from Joel
1️⃣ Growth Hacking done right is not a “black box” and also not a scam or hype, but a sound, coherent method to generate B2B leads at scale by using best practices, technology and data combined with a genuinely curious mindset of people that are embracing continuous learning.
2️⃣ Why moving from a sales-led to a product-led organisation is hard and takes time as time-to-value without human intervention needs to decrease…
...but is essential to consider if you want to have (potential) customers using your product without requiring sales reps, especially for smaller accounts.
1’ How the “Salesforce Sales MBA” works
6’ How interactive small-group work triggered Christian to look into sales
10’ Why asking great questions is crucial in sales
16’ How to gather valuable prospect information from LinkedIn
22’ Why he values and facilitates warm introductions as much as possible
28’ Why he thinks Switzerland’s “LinkedIn Maturity” is not there yet
34’ What he teached 100 Salesforce reps about social selling
39’ Why he sees health as extremely important especially in sales
43’ Why Christian fiercely defends his calendar
1’ Why the right mindset is what differentiates A- from B-players
3’ Why for Umar mindset and not sales training is the new frontier for sales success
8’ How to connect to what’s unconsciously going on and fix limiting beliefs
13’ Why moving from “I know what to do” to “I do it” is so essential
19’ Why showing up fully present is crucial for sales success
23’ How to boost one’s self-esteem before a important sales conversation
31’ How Umar found his mission to help people positively change their mindset
Are you a startup founder and do not really know where to start with building up your sales or you are not happy with the revenue goals you reached so far? This episode will help you: We talk about why it is important to start with your ICP, tactics that help you shorten the sales cycle, and how a sales process actually could look like. There are some special tips in this episode for startups who have a physical product such as healthcare.
1’ Why Constantin & Cyrill founded a Sales Accelerator for Food & Beverage (F&B)
4’ How the opportunity for F&B is still the same as people still consume the same, but differently
7’ Why getting access to and feedback from the right distributors is crucial
9’ How F&B startups can get their products listed faster now than ever
12’ Why startups need to understand when customers now consume their products
15’ Why focus is key for sales
19’ How to spread out from local ambassadors towards big retailers
21’ How to balance opportunity and threat of scaling fast with production partners
24’ How word of mouth and key influence persons can boost your brand
28’ Why directly approaching “the big fish” is often the way to go
30’ Why nailing down a niche can help you not drive your price down
32’ How Planted got a lot of things right in 2020 while going B2B and B2C at the same time
33’ Why Cyrill loves “AldIPA” from Brewdog
1’ How Kajal launched her own startup with next to no B2B sales experience despite her MBA
4’ Why the narrative around sales is often misunderstood
7’ Why sales is a people-driven process
12’ How performance-driven incentives are not necessarily commission payments
16’ Why getting clear and transparent on one’s mission is crucial for sales success
19’ The role of being hyper-local on the ground is important in sales
23’ How customer segmentation got smarter over time
27’ Why - and how - writing a monthly newsletter can still work
33’ How understanding what’s top of mind for people enables outbound sales
37’ How operational activities can change but your DNA should not
39’ Why the biggest mistake of founders is (still) often overbuilding and not investing enough into customer discovery
1' How Matthias' inherently curious mindset brought him into Car Fleet Management
4' How Avrios' failure-tolerant culture helped young people with litte experience to prosper
9' Why being vulnerable in sales creates trust
14' Why customer-centricity is very key in sales
18' How feeling if and how a customer can buy now or later is crucial
22' How having a champion at the customer can help you get even through the Betriebsrat
26' That finding driven & persistent, but also empathic & coachable sales people is really hard
30' How the ego of corporates talking about themselves hurts sales success
34' Why startups need to see hiring through the lens of great sales people
39' That we have all the tools in Switzerland to thrive in B2B Startup Sales, but need to put it together
46' How getting a customer story online took up 9 months in a corporate vs 1/2 day in a startup
1' What brought Stephanie from Salesforce Marketing Cloud (back) to the startup world
6' Why starting product-led growth is a lot easier if you started out that way
10' How product-led growth can cause anxiety in Type A sales people losing control
15' Why really good sales reps might struggle at first with product-led growth
19' How Lumavate defines product-market-fit industry-agnostically
23' How marketing initiatives like custom baseball trading cards stand out
27' Why Stephanie cares about brand awareness instead of conversion for paid ads
31' How to leverage own personas even better
37' How creativity and rapid growth are difficult to combine
41' Why sales people hired as a startup need to have their hands dirty
46' When Stephanie was done being quiet and asking for permission
1' Dirk's start as a call center agent
2' What Dirk learned during his career
5' How to go about the sales processes at a Startups
10' Why consultants never learn to sell
13' Why sportspeople make great salespeople
20' How to balance salespeople's goals with long term goals of the company
22' What makes a good bonus system
25' How to shorten and define the sales cycle
30' How to improve onboarding time
35' Why Dirk joined a startup
38' Lead generation at Comatch
41' Dirk's last advice to you as a sales leader
1' Vijay's story
3' Why Vijay is on a one-year sabbatical
6' Urgency vs. importance
10' Founders: The most important trait looking for the first sales/marketing hire
14' What should or should not be outsourced in marketing
19' KPIs
25' What channels Vijay would go about first as a BtoB startup
35' Recent changes in BtoB marketing
37' Top skills needed in marketing
2' How Max started his first company...
11' ...and got into a burnout
16' The first "secret": Meaningful conversations & summarizing
21' The one thing that helps to shorten the sales cycle
24' How salespeople's actions led to a broken model of selling
28' The technique to start a meaningful sales conversation
32' The second "secret": The irresistible offer
37' The third "secret": Sell results that are relevant in a downturn
44' summarizing the most important points
45' What an irresistible offer needs to consist of
3' How Nico got into sales
11' Why a great company culture is the solution for most corporate challenges
14' What Nico learned in his first sales job
18' On the most important task to succeed in sales
25' The one universal rule in sales
27' On sales salaries and commission
43' Salary Intransparency
44' How Nico grew the consultancy from 2 to 30 people
53' The four layers of objection handling
1' Why entrepreneurship is a lifestyle for Daniel since he was 16 years old
4' Why recruiting is sales at the very core and why trust is key
8' Why "care" is the most important aspect Daniel cares about in recruiting
14' How performance also in sales is more than just numbers
18' Why observing behaviour is a process, making recruiting fundamentally difficult
24' Why Daniel asks less about characteristics and more what they mean to a person
27' Why he was and is impressed by the recruiting process of his new employer
35' Why understanding time is crucial for startup hiring
38' How he finds fulfilment in the process itself without an end-result
42' Why he went from self-employed to employee after 7+ years
1' How Antoine got from a Hotel School into Tech Sales
5' What Antoine likes most about sales: Andrenaline, human contact, and pressure
8' When is the Adrenaline pike in a sales cycle and why it matters
11' How COVID impacted sales
13' When you should mention price in sales
14' why mimicking is important and what to do about it
21' Why you should talk openly about your competition
23' What are key traits to look for in salespeople
27’ Why sales is not for everyone
34’ What makes a good closer and why it is important
40’ Tactics to shorten the sales cycle
2' What sales and software engineering have in common
5' Why Maddy stopped MVPs but believes in Minimum Sellable Products
8' Why founders should differentiate between numbers and process
13' Why skipping steps in the sales process of building relationships does not work
19' What "Differentiate or Die" really means for sales
23' How building funnels bottom-up but executing them top-down matters
31' Why customer acquisition costs is not (only) a job of sales & marketing
32' Why you should only ever automate what already works
36' Why closing knowledge gaps can help shorten sales cycles - if prospects feel comfortable
44' How starting to build a sales funnel in an Excel file or a canvas works perfectly well
1' How sales reps increased revenue by up to 89% after gaining real-time insights from customers
3' How relative feedback scales such as a Likert scale can help sales reps set the right learning priorities
7' What 5 key traits Martin looks for when hiring sales reps
11' Why sales people should adopt the same mentality of constant iterations and learning as in agile, scrum etc.
14' How sales people using the right technology and tools have a competitive advantage
19' How remote sales forces sales people to transition to a value-delivering advisor
22' How people fixing 2-3 key improvement areas instantly increase their conversion rates
28' How sales people in DACH are fundamentally working against a relatively change-resistant culture
31' Why Martin thinks the sales profession will gain more recognition and attractiveness in the years to come
35' What value he got from having worked with sales coaches and when leveraging tools make sense
2' How Moritz experienced a cold call-heavy, "push-style" sales approach early in his career
4' How he went from cold calling to "Cold Looming" and why videos are underused in sales in Europe
7' Why sales people need to be driven for success - and need to be successful in itself
12' How he sees the importance of competitiveness and curiosity as key traits for sales
17' Why people that experienced severe failure see sales as an opportunity to prove something
20' Why Moritz is a super big fan of hiring door-to-door sales people
24' How buying something at a street food festival convinced him of the value of sales coaching
27' Why all the content is out there to consume, but execution is key
33' How he implemented sales habits changing behaviour by practicing real-life scenarios (40x...)
38' How local culture have a direct influence on how you approach prospects
43' Why building strong relationships is crucial especially in Switzerland
45' How Moritz actually started his sales career in primary school with candy and Pokemon cards...
3' Why Yves & Raphael are obsessed about customer centricity
7' Why gathering evidence along the way is key to succeed for iterative product development
11' How they design experiments to test assumptions and hypotheses of their clients
16' How they make pivoting as cheap as possible 21' When Virtual Brands with thought-up products make a lot of sense
25' Why inviting a bunch of people to your innovation laboratory is a completely different ballgame
29' Why spending a little money upfront is great value-for-money to "bet on the right horse"
34' How product validation and B2B sales are in some ways very similar
39' Why "keeping it up" on learning is crucial to get maximum value from market validation
44' Why sales is an essential part of product development
2' How Lisa started building up Customer Success Management (CSM) from scratch
5' Why doing CSM initially for free makes sense until figuring out what people want to pay for
9' Why reflecting if and how your product can generate Customer Lifetime Value without people
12' What to consider when assigning responsibility for renewals to sales vs CSM
18' Why sales needs to be ambitious and creative on how to sell the product in the market
22' How she channeled customer feedback from sales to product management over time
28' What a Product Marketing Manager is actually doing
32' How fast-changing companies require fast-changing adaptations and methods
35' How sales, marketing and product marketing can collaborate to figure out what to build next
38' Why the usual job interview answer "patience is my weakness - which is OK" does not work for CSM
40' What Lisa is up to next...
3' Why he let's new sales reps join sales calls even before formally starting at the company
7' Why starting a sales career as a BDR (Business Development Rep) makes sense
11' When hiring senior sales people makes total sense 16' Why sales is about having a conversation and not pitching
20' Why starting hunting a startup only when you are "ready" is too late
25' Why measuring BDRs in SQLs (Sales Qualified Leads), but also revenue contribution makes sense
30' How culture influences sales compensation structure - "0 vs 2x commission?"
34' How an ARR leaderboard is motivating the whole sales team daily
39' Why keeping the whole team together is key especially when scaling
43' Why evaluating bad sales performance is sometimes like having a bad hand in poker
0' How Thibaut came up with the name SalesLabs and why he became an entrepreneur
4' How he moved from 2.5k to 10k+ LinkedIn followers within 6 months
9' How he balances automated outreach and tools with high-quality engagement
14' Why building habits is key for consistency to achieve sustainable success
21' Why self-awareness is key to be(come) a good VP Sales
25' How he found out that is easier to selling to SDRs than VP Sales
28' Why it is very tough but crucial to make sales person-independent
31' Why your job in sales enablement is building products for the sales team
37' How you can technically find phone numbers online, and why you should be careful with it
40' Why "the DIN (Deutsche Industrie Norm) mindset" is hindering sales innovation in DACH
0’ How he installed Beekeeper’s sales-driven attitude at Yokoy
4’ How breaking down annual goals helps driving continuous sales performance
8’ Why customers need to accept the closing plan and fully commit to it
12’ Why Business Development Reps (BDRs) are a sales guys best friend
16’ Why he is not afraid of signing Kodiak bears now but have them start later
19’ Why attitude is much more important than degrees in sales
22’ Why there is nothing more honest than selling to sales guys
28’ Why it makes sense to have introverted tech people at the sales table
33’ Why sales is all about seeing what works, scale it and then not break it
37’ Why investing into a CRM and data is essential for everybody in sales
40’ Why laziness can be an asset
44’ Why culture shapes how many startups have too many expenses