Champify

Being a top SDR doesn't always translate to being the top AE. Datadog's Neil Flanagan joins Will Falkenborg ?? to share how he prepares his team of 30+ reps and 5 managers for the next step. ?? Grab your spot to hear more about: 1. the frameworks he uses for coaching 2. how he structures enablement 3. the key skills every SDR needs to become a top tier rep

Anastasia Chihai as more than doubled her team's contribution to pipeline in a year. How? Building a cold calling culture. In case you missed it she shared her advice here: https://lnkd.in/e6QNzrPg TLDR; 1. Get buy in from culture leaders and your A players 2. Focus on skill improvement - tailor your coaching based on data 3. Keep it fun and engaging Big thank you to Will Falkenborg ?? for hosting a great conversation with Anastasia!

“Nurture is the new outbound” – an SVP of Sales who previously led GTM teams at multiple unicorns including a 10 figure exit, recently said this to me on a call. Steal this 4 step nurture process we use to revive 2 opps / rep a month: BACKGROUND From our Q3 analysis, a Champify customer has on average 1.8 closed lost opps before they sign on as a customer. In SaaS today, IT’S IMPERATIVE to enable your team to nurture accounts well. A strategy that used to be viewed as a marketing function has shifted toward one that sales must now master. The problem is twofold: 1) Your prospects are inundated with too much email to open your drip emails 2) The bar has gone up dramatically to get prospects to re-engage? THE SETUP This is exactly what we’ve built to help us revive 2 opps / mo / rep. 1) Have real lost reasons Catch all loss codes kill reps’ ability to prioritize lost opps. When creating the loss reasons, you should have a clear answer of exactly WHY someone didn’t move forward. For 9/10 of us “budget” OR “timing” isn’t the real reason. 2) Build in a flow when a rep marks an opp as closed that has two key fields: When should you re-engage? (Date field)? What needs to change in this account for them to move forward? (open text) THE PLAYBOOK 1) Set up an intent provider to know when the account is on your site (or the person) AND notifications if they view and previous collateral 2) Ensure you are monitoring key exec changes and previous user movement into the account 3) One owner from marketing to consistently feeds reps “reasons to re-engage” 4) A flow that resurfaces the account to the rep based on the previous re-engagement date Now you are arming your reps with intelligence of when a certain account is re-engaging with your marketing site or collateral. You have insight into previous champions moving into the account to get intel and craft a more unique POV to get to the real DMs You have insights into key exec movement which typically is a sign of strategic changes coming. Marketing is arming sales with value-based touches to re-engage that includes relevant webinars, new content, product updates, etc — these align to the loss codes reps previously filled out. And, an automated flow to make sure your reps are engaging the account with the right frequency and depth. TAKEAWAY If you, like this SVP and I, believe that nurture is the new outbound, this is a skill your GTM team must master. A consistent flow of revived opps with higher likelihood to close are on the other side.

Nothing better than getting unsolicited feedback from a prospect about one of your AEs (shoutout Nate Segal)! Later today: I'm sharing my learnings from the combination of my 11 Q4s in seat + watching what great sellers like Nate do to close deals on time in Q4. Come join me, Chris Orlob, and others today to poke holes in your Q4 close plans. Sign up here: https://lnkd.in/e4rh9krG

Last week, I talked to 5 different sales leaders who were all focused on creating urgency in their teams' Q4 deals. Here is the BIGGEST MYTH they all believed and a 3 step strategy to land Q4 deals on time: MYTH A strong ROI case drives urgency. After 11 Q4s in my career, THIS IS FALSE. A strong ROI case IS extremely useful to: Help a Champion structure their thoughts for a business case Help secure budget for an investment Help compare one potential investment to another But, it almost never helps drive urgency. Instead, get your reps focused on this 3 step strategy to land Q4 deals ON TIME: (1) Mutually agree with your prospect/customer on an ideal go live date Most seller mess up here by ending the mutual action plan or evaluation plan at the signature. Show the customer how long implementation will take, show examples from the last N customers you brought on, be transparent about potential hiccups, and explain at what point you expect to have adoption and value realization. This can not be a one way street. This must be a mutual agreement of the go live date - not the rep randomly picking when they think it makes sense. (2) Develop a business case that is heavily focused on the cost of INACTION If you and the customer mutually agree that your solution will help ramp their new reps 30% faster, increase their conversion rate on an e-commerce site by 1%, or save 10% engineering hours, you need to spell out the cost of waiting every single week/month. Now they begin to see missed opportunity and there is a cost associated with every time this deal slips. (3) "Compelling events always exist, the best reps will sniff them out" I'll never forget when my old manager said this in a deal review. The best reps know there is always a series of potential compelling events to tie to. Without a compelling event to tie to, it's hard to avoid getting deals pushed. Approach this by being curious and seeking out mini compelling events when the obvious ones don't exist. TAKEAWAY Sales teams have over indexed on the importance of ROI cases. While important, they rarely help drive urgency. If you want to go deeper on these topics, I will be talking with Chris Orlob and other sales leaders in the pclub.io community Thursday. For more info, look down.

I spoke with an SDR leader who doubled pipeline from '23 to '24 and increased outbound pipeline contribution from 20% to 65% her secret? First of all, this SDR Leader is the one and only Anastasia Chihai When she joined Upland, they were inbound heavy Reps had the mindset that outbound didn't work What worked? - Changing expectations - Leveraging top performers - Getting "buy in" from leadership - Personal coaching sessions - The right tech stack We're diving into all of these topics and providing practical examples, templates, and frameworks you can go use immediately tomorrow (Tuesday) at 9am PST / 12 EST. You will still receive a recording + template if you sign up. Here's the link: https://lnkd.in/eKFXXV-V

Anastasia Chihai more than 2x'd the amount of pipeline her team created, making outbound a viable pipeline channel for Upland. Want to learn all her secrets? Last chance to grab your spot for tomorrow ?? https://lnkd.in/ef446uXR Too busy dialing to join? Register and we'll send you the recording plus our biggest takeaways.

From ~$0-10m in ARR at my previous company, we booked < 10% of our meetings via the phones. Today at Champify, we book ~50% of our meetings via cold calls and have a ~77% hold rate.? Here is HOW we do it: First, calling fit our GTM motion as we sell to other GTM leaders. Second, we hire hunter AEs and BDRs. At Champify: 1. We lean into PG religiously – this is the job 2. We’ve hired pace setters like Will Falkenborg ?? who is a top 1% performer and sets the tone for the rest of the company (including our more senior AEs) 3. Practice and role play openers and objections frequently 4. Make the tech and tooling as streamlined as possible -- remove every excuse for reps (agree with Jen Allen-Knuth here) 5. Constantly ask for referrals to get to the right person 6. Have ops and growth folks spend an outsizes amount of time on WHY we are focusing on certain accounts If you want to build a team that picks up the phone & fosters an entire culture around the phones, Will Falkenborg ?? and Anastasia Chihai from Upland Software (ex Outreach) are teaming up to talk about what goes into building a cold calling culture. Details below. If you are too busy dialing during this window: 1) I applaud you? 2) sign up and we will send the recording to you to watch after hours :)

Here’s my highest converting response to “I’m making dinner” or “I’m about to eat” Feel free to try it “Let my explain why I called and I’ll give you something good to chew on” and PAUSE Most SDRs are afraid to be themselves and to incorporate humor / take risks Personally I think it’s because they don’t have an effective calling culture Join our webinar on Creating a Cold Calling Culture on November 12th at 9am PT / 12 ET https://lnkd.in/eKFXXV-V

I’m BLOWN AWAY by how VAGUE and loosely defined the Ideal Customer Profile (ICPs) are for mature sales and marketing orgs. Here is a typical answer I hear, what’s wrong with it, and an example of what GREAT looks like: BACKGROUND In my role as CEO of Champify, I talk with hundreds of prospective and current customers. One of the first things we talk about is their ICP and what their understanding of a “great" target account looks like. I often hear an answer that sounds like this: ““We can kind of sell to anyone. As long as they are above X employees and are in Y industry.” When I dig deeper, it becomes clear they really don’t know what a great fit looks like. The problem here is that with a broad ICP, It’s nearly impossible to market, sell, prospect, qualify, or understand where to spend your time and $ efficiently as a GTM org. Here is a WORLD CLASS example of Chili Piper’s clearly defined ICP and how they prioritize accounts from both sales and marketing: MUST HAVES: *Using Salesforce or Hubspot CRM *In B2B *Has a “contact us” or “free trial” CTA on their site NICE TO HAVES THAT INFLUENCE THE POTENTIAL FIT: *More than 10 reps *High influx of leads *Mix of specialized roles (AE, AM, CSM) *Using a marketing automation solution (marketo, pardot, etc) *Using Sales Engagement tooling *In app optimization tooling EVEN MORE LIKELY TO BUY: *More than 100 FTEs *Has SDRs Notice how clearly defined this is -- using multiple technographics, line of business headcount, business model, and more. TAKEAWAY Vague ICPs are killing sales and marketing productivity. The best GTM teams figure out the most detailed variables and characteristics of their ideal targets and then build process to maximize time/effort with those accounts as possible. PS: Shoutout to Jon Itkin for the breakdown