8 Takeouts about Startup Sales from Steli Efti [SaaS Meetup]
When do we truly connect with our prospects? When do we become a salesperson? How do we sell better? We went to Steli Efti SaaS Meetup Cracow to find out.
Our Questions from SaaS Meetup Cracow
These are a few of the questions asked at the SaaS Meetup #Martech in Cracow organized by Innovation Nest. And Steli, as always, nailed it. Nearly half an hour of questions and answers, without fluff.
1. Things to do in startup sales:
- DO track activity level.
- Watch and measure how your prospects interact. Your prospects’ behavior is extremely important for your reactions. Every action should have a reaction – plan this conscientiously!
- DO call your inbound leads . . .
- . . . five minutes after they sign up for your trial. Don’t leave room for doubt.
- DO care.
- Ask yourself, and ask frequently: when do I truly connect? After one call, two, fifteen? Count, note, gather data – how needy is your prospect. Later, you can make assumptions with niches.
- DO measure.
- The top inside sales metrics are:
- activity
- quality of activity (reach rate)
- conversion
- The top inside sales metrics are:
2. Sales team motivation:
- Use healthy competition, and do fun stuff together.
- Demonstrate – let your sales team see you making tough sales calls (the CEO should make sales calls). Let them listen, and be a role model.
- Fail publicly in front of your team; MOVE ON; do not look for excuses do not blame external factors; do not bow out, hide in a corner or run out of the office; CONTINUE, and make the next call.
3. The most successful sales channel for Close.io is content.
- All of their growth is inbound. Content marketing is an invisible salesperson .
4. When hiring a sales guy, never think you’ve hired an amazing one.
- Selling is constant learning; it depends on team dynamics and the product.
5. In Close.io they do not look for a great salesperson.
- They make a hire, and they train them. Test them – see if they have the guts to grab what they want. Hustle, and hustle hard!
6. To make a great salesman, you have to make them fall in love with the team and company culture.
- After that, they start to love sales.
7. Following up isn’t rude or impolite.
- “You never, ever, ever stop following up! ” But don’t be needy, and don’t make the recipient feel bad.
8. Care about people; don’t use them!
- Whenever you try to contact C-level through assistants, don’t use them. Don’t take advantage of people between you and your contact. Simply care about people. First, ask how YOU can help THEM; later, ask how THEY can help YOU.
Do you have any particular advice? What would you add? Help us give back to this amazing community – share!
