EPISODE SUMMARY
What do you think are the makings of a great software sales leader? Is it having years of sales experience under one’s belt? Is it a sales degree from a famous university? Do they know the ins and outs of sales like the back of their hand? While these can certainly help, the common denominator of all good sales outreach is a solid process.
Greencube CEO Ekin Ober talks about the importance of nailing your sales process and other prospecting techniques with Host and B2B SaaS Sales Coach Matt Wolach. She is also a living testament to how someone without a sales background can succeed. Watch and enjoy becoming another success story in the field of SaaS!
PODCAST-AT-A-GLANCE
Podcast: SaaS-Story in the Making
Episode: Episode No. 242, “How to Be More Effective in Sales Outreach – with Ekin Ober”
Host: Matt Wolach, a B2B SaaS sales coach, Entrepreneur, and Investor
Guest: Ekin Ober, CEO of Greencube
TOP TIPS FROM THIS EPISODE
Keep your Salespeople Happy to Get Results
We cannot stress enough how crucial it is to keep your sales team in high spirits. This starts with providing them with the right tools and a working process. If you do not have either of these, then your salespeople will not get any results. They will inevitably be discouraged, and the lowered morale will affect their work.
This is why it is crucial for SaaS founders to double down in helping their salespeople. You do more than hire a salesperson and throw them out in the wild. You need to keep them happy by supporting them. Ekin’s Greencube ensures your salespeople do not waste time on long lists of low-accuracy leads. Remember, happier employees generally mean higher productivity and better results.
This means a bigger bottom line for the company. End result: everyone is happy.
Make Prospects Feel Special with Personalized Messages
As Ekin has wonderfully worded out, personalizing messages does not end with just stitching a “hi”, brackets, and first name. To truly personalize a prospecting message, you have to go out of your way and research your prospect. You must go through their website and do your due diligence. You have to tailor-fit your message based on that information.
We understand that this can be quite a process. Fortunately, Ekin’s Greencube actually provides you with a well-curated list of prospects and shows you key insights in the dashboard, making it easier for you to write your sales campaigns.
Keep Following Up
More than one follow-up is needed when it comes to prospecting. This doesn’t mean that you should spam your prospect or be pushy about your lead gen. But you have to follow up with different approaches consistently. Remember that your lead is not spending their entire day just looking at their email. Their inbox is also most likely flooded with other sales pitches.
It is important to note that, by different approaches, you have to come up with different messages. Make sure that you are approaching your prospecting from different angles. Remember that those angles must be truly relevant to your prospect. Touch on very particular pain points. Show you’ve done your research in the message. And when they do reply, respond ASAP.
Prioritize DPT when Hiring
DPT stands for diligence, process orientation, and transparency. Ekin advises being mindful of DPT during your company’s hiring process. Do your due diligence to determine if the applicant is the right fit for the role and the company culture. Make sure that they will seamlessly integrate with whatever processes are in place.
Be on the lookout for transparency as well. It’s easy to just focus on the amazing details on their resume. Be watchful during the interview about their actual integrity. Are they laying all the cards on the table? Is there consistency in their answers, and does it line up with what is on paper? Applying DPT will increase your chances of hitting bullseye when hiring and will also empower your team.
Look for Passion in Applicants who Fell Short
For many software founders, the hiring process is quite the learning curve. You look at the picture-perfect CV of an applicant and get impressed by their interview, only to have to let them go because they couldn’t produce results.
Then you take a chance on someone who barely makes the cut in qualifications, only to be pleasantly surprised by their work.
While DPT is a good guide for your talent acquisition or HR department, Ekin and Matt both stress that passion is an excellent indicator of a good employee. Passion more than makes up for what is lacking in qualification because the individual will actually proactively take the effort to learn what must be done in order to get results. Matt also states, “energy and passion can connect you to your buyer extremely well.”
EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS
Prospecting has Three Main Issues
According to Ekin, the three primary issues of prospecting are the overwhelming amount of data, ineffective mass outreach, and the use of private data. There’s usually too much information for your salespeople to process that they opt for generalized mass outreach. They need more time to learn about the prospect, as indicated by their impersonal messages.
Then there’s also the issue of using private data harvested through doubtful means. Your prospect will not be happy being contacted on their personal mobile number. You do not want to start off with lead generation on the wrong foot. Keeping your prospecting ethical is usually a great start in sales. Note that Ekin’s Greencube was created to address these issues.
Process is Essential
Regardless of what field of job you are in, the process is very important. This is why even though Ekin did not have any sales background at all when she started Greencube, she still did a magnificent job at scaling her company, thanks to nailing the process. Flesh out your process and ensure you fill in the gaps by getting the necessary resources. It will set up your company for life.
Pipeline Comes Through Different Avenues
The key to fueling a pipeline is having leads come from multiple avenues. After all, how else will you fill the pipeline if you only use one outreach method? But having different avenues means investing in only some of the existing channels. It’s enough that you concentrate on the avenues where your prospects are likely to be.
TOP QUOTES
Ekin Ober
[8:31] “What do you want to do as a salesperson? You want to make the person feel special. ‘I’ve spent time with you. I spend time looking at your profile. I know a little bit about you. Hey, you posted this recently. Hey, I know this about your company.’ So there’s that research aspect of it.”
[20:01] “I don’t know if I’m a salesperson. I don’t know if I’ll really get to that point. But you told me that it’s never about being a salesperson. It’s about following the process, knowing your process, and knowing what to say, what to do, and when.”
Matt Wolach
[10:18] “Doing it the right way gets the salespeople happier… And if they’re using the right processes and the right tools, it’s going to get the results which of course will make you happy. It’s going to lead to the better bottom line, but it’s also going to make them happy.”
[18:47] “The only reason I would accept them (job applicant) if they’re bare, there is that I see potential, and I see opportunity. And I want to believe in them. And if they come with energy and passion, like you’re saying, that shows me that they’re going to want to put the work in there. They’re going to want to make it work out.”
LEARN MORE
To learn more about Ekin Ober and Greencube, visit: https://greencube.ai/
You can also find Ekin Ober on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ekinober/
For more about how host Matt Wolach helps software companies achieve maximum growth, visit https://mattwolach.com/
