Inside The Pipeline: B2B Sales and GTM
00:12:12 · Tris Tusa, Nick Casale
[00:12:12] S0: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. [00:12:13] S1: So you do have to, like... The the pattern recognition has to has to get... You've gotta be quicker with it. The the rate of of change, your ability to to pick up when something's shifting in the market. Mhmm. Like, I I really used to tell my first time front line leaders at Sendoso. I would be like, hey. Look. Pick one initiative a quarter to go to go focus on. Right? Like, make sure that, you know, find the biggest problem that quarter and sort of hang your hat on being like, I'm gonna fix it, or else you'll sort of just, like, run around solving insignificant problems all the time. You know, and then the intention was to get them to to sort of focus. Right? Yeah. To just train that muscle. [00:12:50] S0: What sort of initiatives would you guys be focusing on? [00:12:54] S1: I think it... It'll be different for any given business. You could definitely pick, like... It could be win rate. Right? It could be win rate. It could be AE generated pipeline. It could be, like, I think that the way we run our first calls could be better. Yeah. I'm gonna, like, figure out what it should look like. I'm gonna overhaul it. It could be, you our know, expansion motion. Like, you could pick anything. Think it'll be specific to the business. [00:13:18] S0: But you give that a whole quarter to to see how it works and then measure it. [00:13:21] S1: No. No. [00:13:22] S0: No. Okay. So that's changed now. [00:13:23] S1: Have to do that, like, on a... A monthly would even be a stretch. Like, I think it's genuinely weekly now.
00:13:23 · Nick Casale, Tris Tusa
[00:13:23] S1: Have to do that, like, on a... A monthly would even be a stretch. Like, I think it's genuinely weekly now. [00:13:29] S0: Yeah. Yeah. [00:13:30] S1: Yeah. Like, your feedback loops, I think that's the biggest change from when I think Sendoso to now, which is is really, like, five, six years ago, I'd say. I think that's what AI, which... And and I'm not saying it's like... I don't think it's necessarily even harder because you do have such incredible technology at your at your disposal to go and do that, which is... Like, especially for me, like, I I I can't focus on... Like, I would just lose track of shit all the time and now Yeah. [00:13:58] S0: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. [00:13:59] S1: Like, claw just does it for me. [00:14:00] S0: Yeah. But do you think now with how fast everything moves that there's enough time to to measure to see what what's working [00:14:08] S1: and what's not? I think you have to pick the... You have to find the leading indicator of what's working. It's kind of like the old, like, Dropbox thing where it's like you don't know if a customer is gonna renew until they renew or don't renew, but they realize that if you, you know, if the person adds... Like, what are the early indicators that tell you it's working? [00:14:28] S0: Yeah. Yeah.
00:14:28 · Tris Tusa, Nick Casale
[00:14:28] S0: Yeah. Yeah. [00:14:28] S1: Yeah. Right? And I think AI can definitely help you pick those, track them, like the measuring of it, pulling the signals together. Like, I can just you know, like, Acronym is a tool that we use. They're great. I can go into Acronym and be like, hey. In the last week across these calls, you know, that... This talk track that we just implemented, can you tell me if we're getting positive or negative reactions on it? And I can get that feedback in real time as opposed to having to go back and just, like, you know, either asking people and people are inherently biased or [00:14:59] S0: you're Yeah. Yeah. [00:15:00] S1: Just listening to call after call after call. [00:15:03] S0: What are some of the initiatives right now that are working really well for your team? [00:15:07] S1: I always go back to... And and, I mean, this is still, I think, back to Talkdesk. Like, one of the first things I learned there being an SDR, and I'd like... I owe it to people smarter than me who taught me this, but, like, you just aren't gonna go wrong spending more time like really trying to understand the business that you're selling into. Yeah. I think that... And I think the reps are so quick to jump to to second and third and fourth order research. And it's like such fast... It's like such incredible research and AI makes it so good. But I think it's easy to lose that like, okay, you've done you've done some high level research now, like, what do you think What do you really think a day in the life sort of looks like? Right?
00:15:07 · Nick Casale, Tris Tusa
[00:15:07] S1: I always go back to... And and, I mean, this is still, I think, back to Talkdesk. Like, one of the first things I learned there being an SDR, and I'd like... I owe it to people smarter than me who taught me this, but, like, you just aren't gonna go wrong spending more time like really trying to understand the business that you're selling into. Yeah. I think that... And I think the reps are so quick to jump to to second and third and fourth order research. And it's like such fast... It's like such incredible research and AI makes it so good. But I think it's easy to lose that like, okay, you've done you've done some high level research now, like, what do you think What do you really think a day in the life sort of looks like? Right? [00:15:49] S0: I I could not agree more. And also, I think physically coming into someone's office and seeing the team and seeing how it's set up and... Oh, okay. So Nick sits here and Freddie's over here from London, and they're going out for dinner tonight to talk about this and this. And he's sitting next to the person in marketing and actually getting that sort of perspective into the business. You then understand what are people's targets? How is it genuinely affecting them? Whereas I feel at the moment, you know, you do an initial half an hour call, and in that call, you have to try and identify the pain points. It's a lot more difficult. 100%. Is is in person interaction something that you guys focus on here? Is that something you're suggesting your team does a lot of?
00:15:49 · Tris Tusa, Nick Casale
[00:15:49] S0: I I could not agree more. And also, I think physically coming into someone's office and seeing the team and seeing how it's set up and... Oh, okay. So Nick sits here and Freddie's over here from London, and they're going out for dinner tonight to talk about this and this. And he's sitting next to the person in marketing and actually getting that sort of perspective into the business. You then understand what are people's targets? How is it genuinely affecting them? Whereas I feel at the moment, you know, you do an initial half an hour call, and in that call, you have to try and identify the pain points. It's a lot more difficult. 100%. Is is in person interaction something that you guys focus on here? Is that something you're suggesting your team does a lot of? [00:16:32] S1: Absolutely. Yeah. We are... We're all in on in person. I always have been. Mhmm. I think I think both for the team, internally and externally, I would say. I mean, all the cliches are true. If you go if you go meet them in person, the deal's gonna close at, like, three times the rate. All that's valid. But I think also for the core team, like, as we hire and grow and expand across markets and with some roles being remote, like, I think I think specific... If you're trying to have it, if I have an enterprise rep who's joining in Austin, I need to make sure they're in an office to ramp, for example. They're... You're just not gonna get up to speed remotely. I think if we learned anything from COVID, that was, like,
00:16:32 · Nick Casale, Tris Tusa
[00:16:32] S1: Absolutely. Yeah. We are... We're all in on in person. I always have been. Mhmm. I think I think both for the team, internally and externally, I would say. I mean, all the cliches are true. If you go if you go meet them in person, the deal's gonna close at, like, three times the rate. All that's valid. But I think also for the core team, like, as we hire and grow and expand across markets and with some roles being remote, like, I think I think specific... If you're trying to have it, if I have an enterprise rep who's joining in Austin, I need to make sure they're in an office to ramp, for example. They're... You're just not gonna get up to speed remotely. I think if we learned anything from COVID, that was, like, [00:17:10] S0: high level. Yeah. 100%. And yet businesses like ElevenLabs seem to do really well performing rightly. I know now that they have offices. I mean, [00:17:19] S1: I think you definitely can... It obviously can be done. It's just harder. I think it's just way harder. I agree. And I would... I... I'll take the I'll take the easy way out on that one. [00:17:30] S0: So you led... I think you led mid market and enterprise at Sendoso Mhmm. Through a series c led by SoftBank [00:17:38] S1: Yeah. [00:17:38] S0: And then left to start your own business. [00:17:41] S1: I did. Yeah. [00:17:41] S0: What was it in you that that meant you wanted to go and try and do it by yourself and and start your own business?