The impact of PLG on enterprise sales motions
On March 29, 2023 I sat in on a discussion between two beacons of enterprise sales success, whom I had the privilege of observing in action at Salesforce 2005-2010. David Rudnitsky and Joe Williams The discussion afforded some very actionable insights and observations with respect to PLG motions in enterprise: [Note: These are my notes and observations, interpreted from David and Joe]
Things sales professionals should know:
- Enterprise prospects control their buying cycle
far more than in the past (Previously, salespeople controlled the information gates). We used to know what the buyer was seeing/doing, but today we don't have that (With the exception of digital interaction monitoring , which is only part of the story) - A big issue with PLG sales motions is that sellers have less of a chance to build value?and hence sellers revert to feature/function (I saw this back in 2012 with Yammer (The enterprise social network before Slack)
- PLG motions often lead to buyers starting small, which opens up significant expansion opportunities
(And the 'post-sales' org is commonly ill-equipped to deal with).
How to address each
1. Enterprise prospects control their buying cycle
Control the controllable. Sellers need to figure out what they need to do to influence the buying cycle at each step. Strong enablement should allow sellers to get a perspective on what the prospect needs at each stage of the journey and enable them with messaging and assets to support. EG Getting an understanding of the buyer needs and helping limit the consideration set early in the process is important.
Trust is key: Perhaps the biggest issue in enterprise sales (PLG version) is the inability to build trusted person-to-person relationships
"Hi Matt, I saw that you were looking at page 12 of our product info - Looks like you are interested in security.?We have SOC II certification and HIPPA compliance.
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[Creepy]
Instead of being 'frontal' with the messaging, it would be far better received if the salesperson didn't reference the research and simply sent a timely note that says:
"Hi Matt - Something that most healthcare orgs need to confirm is our security controls - We are SOC II certified and are HIPPA compliant.?Are there any questions you have relating to security that I can answer for you?"
The response will likely be - "Actually, yes, thanks for the info. I need to confirm that...."
3. PLG motions often lead to buyers starting small
This is a GTM strategy and structural issue that needs to be addressed by the CRO. In a PLG motion you tend to have access to fewer people, so there are two contexts to think about:
- In a commoditized product (IE Simple use-cases), then you can have a simple account manager post-sales motion
where digital breadcrumbs give clues to additional functionality that can be turned on. IE A simple menu of add-ons that allow you to switch things on. - For MOST enterprise products you are actually selling multiple deals within a single org - It is not an organic expansion. In this case you should leave the account with the enterprise hunter who secured the account initially. I like to give enterprise AEs a defined # of accounts and they can keep old accounts for as long as they like (Because they will ditch them if there is not true expansion opportunity, in favor of getting fresh accounts).
I consistently see 80%+ of whitespace in a multi-divisional enterprise account handed over to relationship managers who have neither the inclination nor the competencies needed to open up new doors within existing accounts.
My conclusion
The core tenets of enterprise sales success haven't changed, it is simply how we execute that has. I know for a fact that the vast majority of companies selling to enterprise are leaving money on the table and leaving their flanks open for the competition to move in. I also know that the skills needed are now well documented and pretty much open-source - The reason your team will win is mindset, emotional intelligence and discipline.