Enterprise Sales Development (CIENCE)

In this episode of Enterprise Sales Development podcast, we speak with Justin Michael, an author, consultant, futurist and sales guru. Justin previews his upcoming book, “Tech-Powered Sales: Achieve Superhuman Sales Skills” and talks about what strategic sales training looks like to him. He also shares how to balance the technical and human aspects of sales development and how to work with saturation to create successful situations for engagement.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

A preview of his upcoming book, “Tech-Powered Sales: Achieve Superhuman Sales Skills”

What strategic sales training looks like to Justin

Deconstructing classic techniques such as email and phone for modern technology

Justin’s Route Ruin Multiply method and why conversion is more important than volume metrics

How to balance the technical and human aspects of sales development

How to work with saturation to create successful situations for engagement

QUOTES

“So that’s a big thing for my schtick is like, ‘We gotta start talking. Just because you’re in SDR doesn’t mean that the marketing team is a monthly meeting. Go get to know marketing. They can help you.’” -Justin Michael [03:33]

“The old school and new school methods works. Taking strategic selling into social, taking a strategic set of messaging, making it really itemized like a text message and then sending it in an automatic touch pattern that’s omnichannel, that works.” -Justin Michael [07:42]

“There’s so many authors and consultants and trainers who are pro-phone, but without the technology, there’s low contact rates.” -Justin Michael [22:21]

“What’s weird is that a lot of salespeople are like ‘I’m not technical’ or the sales leader is like ‘We’re not that technical. We’re old school.’ When you say, ‘We’re old school,’ your competitor just won. Someone just took a million dollar deal you didn’t see.” -Justin Michael [35:41]

“Enterprise is lumpy, and so you are kind of harpooning whales. You’re hunting for whales. And a few deals could offset the whole group. So what you want to do is create a consistent outbound motion in TextSTAT that’s going to optimize you statically for the highest possibility. It’s almost like building a lobster troller and a spearfishing operation at the same time.” -Justin Michael [48:40]

TIMESTAMPS

[00:01] Intro

[00:22] Meet Justin

[03:57] His upcoming book

[08:44] Strategic sales training

[12:10] Deconstructing email and phone

[21:56] Route Ruin Multiply

[30:04] A polarity shift

[33:05] Balancing the technical and human aspects of sales development

[39:31] Working with saturation to create successful engagement situations

[42:19] Conversion over volume metrics

[51:59] CRM in the future

RESOURCES

Tech-Powered Sales: Achieve Superhuman Sales Skills by Justin Michael and Tony Hughes

Lars Nilsson on LinkedIn

Conversion rate optimization (CRO)

Josh Braun

The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Route Ruin Multiply

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In this episode of Enterprise Sales Development podcast, Eric Quanstrom and Harry Evans, from CIENCE Technologies speak with Jason Prindle, Director of Inside Sales & Global Sales Development at BigID, about enterprise sales development. Jason shares what type of services BigID provides and their sales approach in working with their customers and clients. He also talks about how he works with the sales development reps (SDRs) to provide the most efficient communication with the clients as well as the sales reps.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

What is BigID

Jason’s ideal customer/client profile and how he built that

How they determine the groups and internal landscapes of their target accounts

How they have the sales territories lined up

How SDRs communicate with sales reps

How he determines how much SDRs need to know to do their job right

Where he sees sales trends going in 12 months

QUOTES

“A lot of times, the connection that we have helps drive that conversation.” -Jason Prindle [17:29]

“I think that level of personalization honestly is kind of played out, I don’t know that it really works that well. Me personally, I get annoyed if someone says something about a school I went to or you know, I’ve got a quote from Yoda on my LinkedIn profile. Sometimes, I kinda appreciate the effort, but it’s like eh, it’s not really moving the needle. I want to know what you’re doing for me in my role to make my life easier, and I think that’s really important.” -Jason Prindle [19:47]

“I’ve never been a guy who looks at those daily KPIs unless it’s the root cause of a problem or a success.” -Jason Prindle [29:17]

“I encourage them to take it as far down the road as they can, because it’s a good training ground for that next step. The hand off from SDR to AE is a discovery call. It’s further discovery, and the first thing you have to learn as a good sales rep is discovery and how to continue to do more discovery.” -Jason Prindle [40:25]

TIMESTAMPS

[00:01] Intro

[01:59] Meet Jason and his team at BigID

[03:12] What is BigID and Jason’s ideal client profile

[07:01] Defining the groups and internal landscape of the targets

[09:02] How sales territories are lined up

[14:41] How SDRs communicate with sales reps

[18:48] Personalizing their messaging

[28:20] Jason’s key KPIs in the multi-channel strategy

[34:40] Normalizing cohort norms

[38:17] Educating SDRs

[42:02] Where he sees trends going in 12 months

[46:30] A quick pitch of BigID

CONNECT

Jason Prindle on LinkedIn

BigID website

BigID on Linkedin

BigID on Facebook

BigID on Twitter

BigID on on Youtube

CIENCE website

CIENCE on LinkedIn

CIENCE on Facebook

CIENCE on Twitter

CIENCE on Instagram

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Eric Quanstrom takes a break from hosting duties and sits in the guest seat in this episode of Enterprise Sales Development podcast. Eric is the CMO at CIENCE and talks about enterprise sales development from his perspective. He shares what makes hyperspecialization worthwhile and why CIENCE redirected itself around that idea. He also discusses how he manages a large group of SDRs and how he set up CIENCE to handle the constant turnover. Listen as he shares three important questions to ask in a sales pitch.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

What is CIENCE and what is unique about it

What makes hyperspecialization worthwhile and why CIENCE has redirected itself around that idea

What trends is Eric seeing across the industries and where he thinks things are going in the next three to five years

What the LinkedIn channel brings to the table

What Eric thinks of when he thinks enterprise sales development

What type of considerations people don't think about with a large group of SDRs and how Eric has set up CIENCE to handle constant turnover at that position

What he has done to boost CIENCE’s online presence and branding

What it means to think like an enterprise

What is a buying group and how it’s becoming more relevant these days

Three important questions to ask in a pitch

QUOTES

“When you have brand familiarity, you have a lot. There’s a huge difference between, in preference and reciprocality that comes with familiarity.” -Eric Quanstrom [13:41]

“Most prospects are, what I would argue and we teach and train this all day long at CIENCE, they’re self-interested above all else, and that’s not a bad thing. It’s not a pejorative concept. Self-interest is what drives most people to actions.” -Eric Quanstrom [14:22]

“I would also say that we’ve worked our asses off to build a culture and a business that people want to be at.“ -Eric Quanstrom [27:51]

“Every interaction that we have with our organization is first fronted by an SDR. Period. Full stop. End of story.” -Eric Quanstrom [31:09]

“If I know what somebody is worried about, is concerned with, what their goals are, what they want to achieve, what bugs them, what their discomforts are, like that’s all persona level data that I can use to further my engagement cause with that individual.” -Eric Quanstrom [46:00]

TIMESTAMPS

[00:01] Intro

[00:44] Meet Eric

[01:46] What is CIENCE and what’s unique about it

[04:11] Hyperspecialization

[08:24] Trends in the industry

[12:29] The LinkedIn channel is worth to pursue

[16:31] What you’re selling is a meeting

[19:50] Two ways to think of enterprise sales development

[22:56] Managing a large group of SDRs

[30:03] CIENCE’s online presence and branding

[34:22] Thinking like an enterprise

[39:12] Buying groups, personas and ICPs

[48:59] Three important questions to ask in a pitch

[50:56] The gap between sales, sales development and marketing

[56:05] Eric’s next pet project

RESOURCES

Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell

Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Fish With a Spear, Not a Net: Engagio's Jon Miller Talks Account-Based Marketing on Marketing Smarts

Inc. 5000 Fastest

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In this episode of Enterprise Sales Development podcast, we speak with Gerry Praysman, Sr. Director of Sales Development at SalesLoft. Gerry shares Salesloft’s thoughtful approach to finding the right types of people from unique, non-traditional places instead of the traditional SDR paths. He discusses some of the traits, skill sets, mindset and experience level they seek as they attract quality talent.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

What SalesLoft does and how it and the organization Gerry leads are currently set up

How the company thinks about their buying group through metrics and from an ideal customer profile and a few hacks Gerry uses to search for those unique titles that could bring in potential clients

How Gerry’s background brought him to his approach

How they divide commercial and enterprise in terms of territories; what are the types of sales teams that can get the most value of what they do

Whether they start new employees at the lowest level and promote the upwards as they go or look for certain characteristics and traits in prospective team members

Some of the skill sets, traits, mindset and experience level they look for in team members and relevant examples

How they teach and train education for clients and prospects as they target enterprise vs when they target SMBs and mid-market sized companies

QUOTES

“Studying the role, not the title.” -Gerry Praysman [08:24]

“It comes down to how we like to grow, which is efficiently. We typically do not like to throw heads at problems. We like to figure things out and scale in a very effective way, in a very thoughtful way.” -Gerry Praysman [17:45]

“We prioritize progress over perfection, right? It’s not so much that we wait for things to be perfect to go, but we like to put a good level of thought. We like to plan things pretty well before we just kind of dive off the deep end.” -Gerry Praysman [18:52]

“I think a lot of people who are intentional are looking to get into the software industry from other industries. Again, there’s still great candidates in software that have SDR experience that would be a good fit, but I think most recruiters or most teams like go there first and think that’s the well. And in my opinion and experience, that’s not the well. I think that’s the exception.” -Gerry Praysman [29:34]

“There’s no right or wrong way to do anything. You just have to be intentional about what you’re doing.” -Gerry Praysman [39:12]

TIMESTAMPS

[00:01] Intro

[02:00] Meet Gerry

[03:40] How SalesLoft is currently set up

[07:15] The ideal customer

[11:32] Hacks to find unique titles

[13:50] How his background shapes his approach

[17:18] Signifying customers based on employee size

[24:12] Their hiring profile and how to find them non-traditionally

[33:52] The concept of business acumen

[39:21] Teaching and training education for clients and prospects

[50:44] SalesLoft pitch

RESOURCES

Leading Sales Development: The Art and Science of Building Exceptional Teams by Alea Homison and Jeremey Donovan

CONNECT

SalesLoft website

Gerry Praysman on Twitter

Gerry Praysman on LinkedIn

CIENCE website

CIENCE on LinkedIn

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In this episode of Enterprise Sales Development podcast, we speak with Sam Silverman, founder of Silverman Capital. Sam shares his approach and perspective at the SDR role as a job as well as a leveling opportunity for a career. He discusses how he manages his team, from his hiring practices to training in this rapid industry to tracking their progress. Listen as he also explains why it’s important to understand your buyer.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

How much Sam is able to leverage understanding business models, where the prospects are trying to go, equating that with SDR success and outperforming quota and how he developed this mindset

How he took the learnings from his previous work to manage a larger SDR team and how he teaches others in a rapid industry

His hiring strategies and how he tracks and monitors progress with his team members

What he does to help his team succeed by ensuring they know who they are selling to and preparing them for problems

How he trains his teams to communicate with and manage the sales teams they service and how transfer of knowledge works at the organization

How much of his day is spent learning vs selling both as an SDR and a leader

QUOTES

“Understanding in sales and life in general, where someone’s coming from I think allows you to humanize the interaction and level the playing field versus I’m an SDR reaching for someone 3-4-5 ranks above me in terms of totem pole. It allows you to really remove that barrier about it.” -Sam Silverman [05:14]

“I think a big thing which is focusing on who you’re selling to. Understanding why does this person care about anything you’re saying. I think the more you understand your buyer, the better off you’ll always are.” -Sam Silverman [08:40]

“I think something that people don’t realize is that different profiles and styles of work can both produce extremely solid results. I think a big issue that I’ve seen is people want to put everyone into one box and think that each person coming in can operate in that box and perform at a high level when you may have different people, 3-4-5 different profiles of people, who all perform that top tier of the group, but do it in entirely different ways.” -Sam Silverman [10:51]

“And then you have people who make a very, very good effort. They’re never going to be an A player, and there’s still a big value in those people.” -Sam Silverman [15:17]

“I’m a big advocate of done, not perfect.” -Sam Silverman [28:21]

TIMESTAMPS

[00:01] Intro

[00:32] Meet Sam

[03:13] Connect the dots, but still be relevant

[07:31] How Sam uses his learnings to manage his team

[12:12] His hiring strategies

[14:40] Managing his team members

[24:52] Sales development isn’t part of marketing or sales

[29:18] Extreme transparency is key

[31:43] Handling knowledge transfer

[34:16] How much of his day is spent learning vs selling

[36:??] What’s next for Sam and how to contact him

CONNECT

Silverman Capital’s website

Silverman Capital on LinkedIn

Sam Silverman on LinkedIn

CIENCE website

CIENCE on LinkedIn

CIENCE on Facebook

CIENCE on Twitter

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We are excited to launch the Enterprise Sales Development podcast. Get a sneak peek at some of the amazing conversations we've had.

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