In today’s episode of the Startup Selling Show we have Niko Hughes. Niko is the Co-Founder and COO of SDRemote.

SDRemote is an outsourcing & consulting company focused on helping early stage startups (Pre Seed - Series A) achieve market validation, logo acquisition and build the revenue stream they need to receive additional funding or reach profitability.

Prior to starting SDRemote, Niko spent the last 5 years working in sales and marketing with a number of different startups. Niko, along with his brother Anthony Hughes, decided to start SDRemote because they saw that early stage companies had a need to ramp up sales, but lacked the know-how.

Throughout the course of the conversation  Niko and I talked about sales process management. We specifically focused on the top of the funnel.

Some of the specific topics we covered are:

• Biggest mistakes companies make when kicking off their sales work.
• Personas VS Target Buyers.
• How to test a market.
• Laser focus selling.
• Length of the buying process.
• Cold Calling best practices.
• Warm Calling.
• How to qualify inbound leads.

Tools mentioned

• SalesLoft
• Outreach

Books Mentioned:

• Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less

How to get in touch with Niko:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nikohughes/
• SDRemote: sdremote.co
• Email: niko@sdremote.co - If you’re ever in Portland, Oregon, shoot him a note to go for coffee or beer.

Get a FREE copy of my book: “Startup Selling: How To Sell If You Really, Really Have To And Don’t Know How.”

Justin, along with his brother, Co-Founded Disco, which is a software company that focuses on helping teams appreciate each other on top of other communication platforms.

Prior to Disco, Justin worked at Intuit as Territory Sales Manager, he was also Account Executive at Gigya, and Director of Enterprise Sales at Nomu.

In this episode we dove deep into Company Culture and Core Values. Some of the specific topics that we covered are:

• What is company culture?
• Mission/Vision/Values - The difference between each.
• Growth mindset.
• Keep it 100 - Being brutally honest.
• Tying circles - Being able to iterate fast.
• Using qualitative and quantitative analysis.
• Cash Rewards vs Experiential Rewards
• Backward-bending labor supply curve.
• Most popular experiential rewards -- Personal/Career Growth, and Personal Wellness.

Some of the books, and resources that were mentioned:

• Backward-bending labor supply curve:
• Principles: Life and Work by Ray Dalio
• Payoff: The Hidden Logic That Shapes Our Motivations by Dan Ariely
• Predictably Irrational, Revised and Expanded Edition: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions by Dan Ariely
• The Alliance: Managing Talent in the Networked Age by Reid Hoffman

Where to get in touch with Justin:

Email: justin@justdisco.com

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/justinlvandehey/

Website: www.justdisco.com

Welcome to another episode of the Startup Selling Show. In today’s episode we have Xan Gentile. Xan is the Head of Account Management at Blend (also, one the best dressed man in the mortgage industry). He has been with the company since it’s early days. Now they’ve raised a series D an the team has grown to 400+.

Xan’s has been selling large enterprise software deals to the mortgage and financial markets for three and a half years, so given his success and experience I thought he would be an AWESOME guest for the Startup Selling Show.

In this episode we went deep into Customer Success, Account Management, and Enterprise Sales. Some of the specific topics that we covered are:

• Using a Situation Slide for your product demos.
• Tribal Cultures.
• Post-Sale Product Adoption & Usage.
• Implementation Plans.
• Product Road Maps.
• Hiring project managers for your sales teams.
• Agile Methodology.
• 3x3x3 Weekly Review Method.

How to get in touch with Xan:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexandergentile/

Twitter:

David Dulany is the CEO and founder of Tenbound, which is a consulting and training firm that focuses 100% on sales development in the tech space in the Bay Area.

He’s also the organizer of The Sales Development Conference (Check it out here: https://tenbound.com/conference), and, as you can imagine, he’s an expert when it comes to sales development.

In this episode, we really focused on one main topic: sales development.  Just a few of the things that we covered:

• Cracking the code of sales development.
• Why founders need to be Sales Rep first.
• Why being an SDR is the toughest job in the sales process.
• Compensation Structures For SDRs.
• Traits to look when hiring SDRs.
• Why train on persona instead of product - Lead with the problem you solve not your solution.
• How to balance quality vs. quantity when doing outbound calls -- Use chunking.
• Outsourcing research for your SDRs.
• How to make your outbounds feel less cold.
• Why you need a sales navigator in your organization.
• The 18-month payback period - Getting ROI from your hires.
• The #1 key metric for sales managers and their SDRs.
• The "two-volley email" and why it's a key signal in your lead development and qualification.

Some of the books and resources that were mentioned by David:

• T Harv Eker - https://www.harveker.com/
• Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion - Robert Cialdini
• How to Get a Meeting with Anyone: The Untapped Selling Power of Contact Marketing - by Stu Heineck
• The Sales Development Conference

Where to find David on the Interwebs:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkdulany/
• Personal Blog: http://www.daviddulany.com/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/dkdinsf
• Podcast: The Sales Development Podcast

Getting in touch with David: www.tenbound.com/contact