Episode #165: Steve Benson

Evaluate the ROI before Making a Decision

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Steve Benson

After receiving his MBA from Stanford, Steve worked in sales at IBM and Google, where he was Google Enterprises top sales executive in 2009. In 2012, Steve founded Badger Maps, an app that helps field sales people optimize their roots and schedules to save time and to be on time so they can sell more. [01.03] Steve defines the term ‘Sales Technology Stack’ – as ‘all of the technology used to enable and track sales teams and sales activities’.

[01.16] Why is it so important for businesses today to have a solid sales technology stack? – Steve feels that If you don’t leverage the sales technology to do the repetitive parts of your sales job and to enable parts of your sales job, you’re either wasting more money on sales reps if you’re a business or wasting a lot of your time if you’re a salesperson.

[02.18] Steve explains why salespeople resist taking on new technologies as part of their day-to-day sales roles – a combination of sales people being pressed for time and previous bad experiences of new technology being introduced for the benefit of others has made them resistant to new technology.

[03.39] Steve discusses some sales technologies that modern sales professionals be using as a minimum – It all depends on the type […]

Episode #164: Drew D’Agostino

Anchor Down

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Drew D’Agostino

Drew is the CEO and founder of Crystal Knows, which is an artificially intelligent psychometric platform, which accurately predicts the personality style of people from their social media profiles. [00.50] Drew defines the term ‘Sales Technology Stack’ – as simply ‘the set of technologies that you use every day and rely on’.

[01.11] Why is it so important for businesses today to have a solid sales technology stack? – all of your competitors are using technologies that are making them more efficient, giving them more information about the customers, and ultimately it creates a probably superior customer experience now. So if you’re not using our effective technology tools or data in your sales process, you will simply deliver a experience that is not on the same level as your competition, really.

[02.04] Drew explains why salespeople resist taking on new technologies as part of their day-to-day sales roles – Drew agrees that we are creatures of habit and also creatures of routine and tradition. If something has been working for you for a while, you have the benefit and drawback of inertia. So if you’ve got confidence in something that’s been working, introducing some uncertainty into that mix with a new tool we tend to see the potential loss of that greater than we will perceive the potential value that’ll […]

Episode #163: Wart Fransen

CRM is the Starting Point.

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Wart Fransen

Wart is the co-founder and CEO of LeadBoxer, which is a lead and customer data platform. Where he spearheads the growth and product development for the company. He has two decades worth of experience in SAS, software development, and online marketing. LeadBoxer is the third company he has founded. [00.59] Wart defines the term ‘Sales Technology Stack’ – In Wart’s opinion a stack represents a collection of tools that you stack on top of each other. And the important thing is that they are connected, of course. And because once they are connected the sum of the tool is greater than the tool separately.

[01.28] Why is it so important for businesses today to have a solid sales technology stack? – Wart shares that it’s important because you are able to basically get the processes right. Because sales has become more of a process than it has become a free floating thing, so the processes are very important, and the stack allows you to stay within that process.

[01.59 Wart explains why salespeople resist taking on new technologies as part of their day-to-day sales roles – Wart feels that sales people should focus on their selling rather than the process but a process is needed. Using new technologies breaks sale peoples focus on selling by asking them […]

Episode #162: Leeno Karumanchery

Measure, Measure, Measure, Report, Report, Report.

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Leeno Karumanchery

Leeno is Chief Diversity Officer for MESH Diversity, a Canadian software company that offers an online hiring tool that helps ensure behavioral fit of employees for both diversity and inclusion. [00.56] Leeno defines the term ‘Sales Technology Stack’ – as a combination of different processes including the notion, the tools, the training and the processes to obtain market insights that help a salesperson do their job effectively as well as finding the right people to do the job.

[02.14] Why is it so important for businesses today to have a solid sales technology stack? – Leeno explains that just being an excellent sales person doesn’t necessarily mean you would make a good account manager, so being able to use technology stack to find the right people for the right job will help set businesses apart.

[03.32] Leeno explains why salespeople resist taking on new technologies as part of their day-to-day sales roles – Leeno feels that some humans just don’t like change and it’s just part of being human. If you’re going through a change process of any kind, 30% of people fight you tooth and nail whether you’re in sales or not.

[04.42] Leeno discusses some sales technologies that modern sales professionals be using as a minimum –the basic ones that allow you to do your […]

Episode #161: Kevin Dixon

Stack Around Your Established Sales Process.

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Kevin Dixon

Kevin is the founder of Boxxstep, a Buyer Relationship Management, the Buyer Enablement platform for complex and enterprise sales which focuses on the before and after in the opportunity management process. Prior to Boxxstep, Kevin spent 20 years in executive sales leadership roles with global tech companies like Ericsson, Siemens and Logica. Kevin was also the EVP of Sales and board member for a successful software start-up elara, who were the original pioneers of app download to mobile devices before Apple and Google solutions. [01.20] Kevin defines the term ‘Sales Technology Stack’ – As any sales software that will help individuals, teams, or companies achieve and exceed revenue and sales KPIs. However, Kevin prefers to refer to the sales tech as a revenue stack, calling it the revenue stack makes it accountable and measurable in terms of results as it was intended to achieve.

[02.21] Why is it so important for businesses today to have a solid sales technology stack? – Because selling has become tougher, there’s more competition, it’s more complex and there are more people involved. The benefit of software makes the role more efficient and more effective.

[03.04] Kevin explains why salespeople resist taking on new technologies as part of their day-to-day sales roles – It is actually not just new technologies. CRM […]

Episode #160: Kate Bradley Chernis

Robots Can’t Replicate The Human Connection.

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Kate Bradley Chernis

Kate is the co-founder and chief executive officer of Lately. She is also a marketing agency owner with more than 25 years of brand-building experience and extensive CMS development as well as sales and national broadcast communications experience. With clients including Walmart and United Way Worldwide. [01.01] Kate defines the term ‘Sales Technology Stack’ – as a marketer, Kate views Sales Technology Stack as a kind of an explosion of craziness! They’ve tried several CRM systems and are now happy with Nimble.

[02.42] Kate explains why salespeople resist taking on new technologies as part of their day-to-day sales roles – Kate shares that nobody likes change, not just salespeople. However Kate feels that a lot of what we do happens over the internet these days and writing is a big thing that makes the hurdle of changing different tech stacks even harder, because there’s a lot of input you have to do. You have to get everything ready, transfer systems over again, and the writing element can be a hurdle.

[04.25] Kate discusses some sales technologies that modern sales professionals be using as a minimum – Kate is an avid fan of Nimble, but feels that the technology is nice, but it’s not the only thing. The thing is the human connection. Coming from […]

Episode #159: Jon Ferrara

People Buy Better Versions of Themselves with AI

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Jon Ferrara

John is a CRM and relationship management entrepreneur and noted speaker about social media’s effects on sales and marketing. He has re-imagined CRM by building a simple smart CRM for G suite and Office 365, his most recent venture, Nimble.com. It is the first CRM that works for you by building and updating contact data for you. Then works with you everywhere you work. Ferrara is best known as the founder of Goldmine Software Corp, one of the early pioneers in Salesforce automation and customer relationship management. He has recently been recognized on Forbes as one of the top 10 social CEO’s, top 10 social salespeople in the world, and top 100 marketing influences. [01.48] Jon defines the term ‘Sales Technology Stack’ –it’s the tools of sales success, it all kind of started back in the stone age with stone tablets and kind of moved on to Rolodex and then became more sophisticated with six by nine index cards that people used to use to log notes on calls and schedule next tasks and then order them on date of recall date. And that was really the precursor to what we invented with Goldmine. Ultimately all that evolved into CRMs, however CRMS weren’t really enough. You needed tools for sales intelligence and […]

Episode #158: Shawn Finder

Maximize Sales Conference ROI With AI

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Shawn Finder

Shawn is the founder and CEO of AutoKlose, which is a sales enablement platform with a built in business-to-business database. He is a former professional tennis player who has now bootstrapped multiple software companies to break even within six months of launch. Shawn is a top influencer in the sales community, and speaks globally about prospecting. [01.01] Shawn defines the term ‘Sales Technology Stack’ – means a combination of different tools that help you receive the best results, but with the least amount of effort.

[01.24] Why is it so important for businesses today to have a solid sales technology stack? – Shawn explains a few reasons, as new sales tools become available, sales reps and managers need to embrace the wide variety of new technologies that are always coming on the market, but also, sales leaders need to know the different platforms on the market and adjust accordingly.

[02.32] Shawn explains why salespeople resist taking on new technologies as part of their day-to-day sales roles – What I would say is, sales people want to focus on also making money and not learning new things. They want to do what they’ve been doing for years, but LinkedIn, Facebook, and all this other stuff wasn’t available 40 years ago, so you have to create a new […]