S4E46 - I love you sales, but you don't love me.

Yep.

What's up everybody? Welcome to another episode of the surf and sales podcast. I am Scott Lease here with my good friend and partner in crime, Richard Harris. What's up Richard?

Dude, I am excited to see you. Haven't talked to you in a while. And you know, as you know, I'm dealing with some Buddies tonight. It's October 11th to see Guns N Roses. So you know, I'm super excited and really excited that there's going to be, you know, six white guys pulling up in a minivan to a GNR concert. So yeah, I'll be sure to post some videos of that on TikTok in.

Are you in the AARP section for this concert?

Well played. Scott doesn't, Scott doesn't hound me hard, but when he does, it's beautiful. We are. You're not on the lawn. We're actually sitting in chairs. So you know, it'll be interesting to see how many people are like standing up, you know.

Yeah, well that doesn't surprise, I mean you know, 55 plus. I don't know if you can stand for two and a half hours at a, at a rock concert anymore.

Back, back.

Might give out.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can give a free plug to Depends because I don't want to miss a moment.

Well, we're happy you all y' all joined us. We are here with a long time sales leader and thought leader and consultant who now runs her own go to market consulting firm called MSP Consulting, focused on the enterprise. Her name is Monica Stewart and we'll bring her on in just a second. But first Richard is going to talk to us about HubSpot and all the wonderful things that they're up to.

Yeah, you know we are in the Q4 moment, right. For most people so it's crunch time, particularly 2023 has been an interesting year.

And if you didn't know this about HubSpot, they built a thing called Sales Hub which gives sales reps some deal making tools to help win the deals you're looking for. So if you are already a sales a HubSpot customer, be sure to check out the Sales hub. If you're not and you're looking for something like a CRM, be sure to check it out. It talk, it helps with smart sequences, it can help with prospecting your workspace and scheduling goals and all your to do lists and keep you super organized and focused which I always need. And yes, yes there is even AI not only for copy but for your forecasting to help you figure that stuff out. So please Check them out@HubSpot.com you know, they will help make sure that closing deals are no big deal. So thank you HubSpot, for being a part of us and supporting us. And check them out@HubSpot.com oh, HubSpot.com sales. Scott, you're supposed to correct me.

I don't know. I don't have these URLs memorized. This is not my skill set. Strong suit. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome Monica Stewart to the show. How's it going, Monica?

Hey guys, it's going great. Thanks for having me.

Yeah. Talk to us about MSP Consulting. I, I was just looking and you started two or three months after I did out on my own. So. So we sort of started at what was arguably like the worst point in time possible, right when yeah started. So talk to everybody a little bit about what you do at MSP and, and how you got into that.

Yeah, absolutely. So MSP Consulting is, is my company. And basically what we do is we help B2B tech startups build sustainable, go to market teams. Kind of like you do, Scott. I don't do the, the like 0 to 1. We kind of focus more on like the 2 to 10. So like you know, first time early stage founder that doesn't have any customers yet. That's not really our market. We really work with companies that have achieved like some kind of milestone. They've got some level of success, but they're stuck there and they need to figure out how to get to the next level. And usually that's something around a new revenue plateau or a new funding milestone that they want to hit or maybe even getting the founder out of sales. And kind of my, the way that I ended up here is that, you know, I've been in sales my whole life. I think like most of us have. Right. And I was honestly just really good at it. Like every job that I did, I was always the top performer. I got promoted. I was pretty lucky to pick some really good companies. Like there was one point at which like four out of the last five companies that I had worked with had all been acquired and they were all really successful acquisitions.

So on one level it was all going like really well and I loved my career. But then on another level I was getting really, really, really burned out and that was pretty much all I was doing. And so I actually ended up leaving the industry for a while and taking some time to figure out what it really was that I wanted to do. Like, so when you talk about bad timing, I, my first, the first time that I tried to leave the sales industry was at the end of 2019. And I'm going to tell you guys a story that I actually haven't told anybody publicly before. And the reason that I did that was because I wanted to switch my career entirely and move into nightlife. I was working on opening a venue in New York City, which is always something that I've been interested in on the side. Like, I started organizing raves when I was like 16. And so like beginning of 2020, first three months of 2020, I raised like over a million dollars to open this club. And then I'm like, great, I know where I'm going. And I'm like. And then I'm like, well, this is cool. So like, we like, we're putting in an offer on a building. We had like architects. Like, we were really like doing the whole thing. And then I was like, okay, I can see how for the next, you know, maybe like 912 months, there's not going to be a lot of stuff for me to do. Like, I made a five year financial model, I did all this fundraising stuff. Like we had all of the designs. You know, like, that's kind of the work that I can do. And I'm not going to manage contractors, so I'm going to have some free time. So maybe I should do some consulting, because why not, right? I don't want to just be like sitting around. And so I started working with a couple of clients. And then like, literally right after I made that decision, and I didn't really do very much, I just changed my title on LinkedIn to independent consultant. And I got like a, you know, a flood of, of dms.

And so then within like two weeks of me signing those contracts, of course, like, there was no point in trying to plan to open a nightclub anymore. And we're like, oh, it's going to be like three weeks and then it's like months and then it's like years. And during that time I just went all in on my consulting work. And I think that what was, what was good about that decision was that it was actually some of the best work that I've ever done. But what was bad about that decision was that during that time that everybody was like, wow, that was so nice that we got to take a break and I went and traveled the world and I learned how to make sourdough bread and tie dye stuff and all of those things. I, I was working like 90 hours a week.

And I wasn't really taking time to like, Take care of myself. I was just like, gotta get this done, gotta get this company acquired. Like, gotta make sure that they're successful. And so once I had kind of like finished those projects and they did go really well, like one of the companies that I was working with got acquired for like 6x, what they were valued at when we started. And that was in less than a year. So that was like a great story for them.

I realized that I really needed to like take a step away and just take a break from sales in general because I had just like been going at it too hard for too long. And I was kind of like, I don't ever want to talk to someone about their Salesforce dashboards, like, ever again. And so I couldn't see at that time a way that I could continue to be in this industry and use all of the skills, skills that I had that I had without all of that stuff. Because I had only grown up in a world where it was like, you know, you're working 80 hour weeks, you're doing three people's jobs, you're always on, you sleep for five hours a night. It was like major hustle culture, right? Like I came up in like the mid 2000s, so that's just kind of what we were all doing. And I thought that all of those things had to go together. So I was like, well, that's it, I gotta leave. It was like a bad relationship. It was like, like, I love you, but like, you don't love me. Like, I gotta go.

So I took about a year and a half off and I went and did a whole bunch of other things. I started a booking agency, I started a bunch of event companies. And I kind of like had that, that break that I've never had in my entire life. I guess a sabbatical or something like that. And then after a while I started to realize that I really missed a lot of things about the work that I had kind of spent my entire career doing. And I think that for me, like, one of the reasons that, that I kept coming back to it is I think it's really important work. Like, my parents are entrepreneurs. I watched my dad build a company when I was growing up and I saw him like get up at 5am and read the Wall street journals and read all the business books. And like, he dropped out of high school when he was 15. Like he didn't have the like, background to do that. And I just saw how much work he put into making it happen. And he ended up being very successful at it. And, like, I know what it takes for somebody to, like, quit their cushy job at, like, a bank and, like, go and raise some money and, like, pour everything they have into this startup. And the first three years, nobody cares. Like, I really, really, really want founders to be successful. And I was like, I know that I can do that. So I started going back, and I started with literally just having conversations with everybody that I'd ever worked with, and I was like, so what would you guys say it is that I do here? Like, I was. I literally just started from zero, and I was like, what am I good at? Like, what did I do for you? Like, what was helpful for you in our relationship? And then from there, I started pretty much, like, rebuilding what I like, what my offering is and how I work with companies, just kind of starting with those first principles of what it is that I'm really good at and the things that I think that people need the most. And I don't really talk about Salesforce anymore.

Good for you.

So I think I have other people that can do that.

The most important thing I got out of that, Scott, I don't know if you tell me, is that she has a client that exited in one year. Right. Like, we've never had that. Not that fast.

Well, it wasn't the first year.

It wasn't the first year of the company. They'd been doing this for a little while before I came along, but.

Yeah, but what was the. Like, was. What was the aha moment? Right. So you left to go do this dream, right. Which is like, you followed this passion, which, you know, I think Scott and I told people all just quit. Go do what you really want to do. Right?

Right.

You can always come back. Right?

Right.

What, aside from you didn't have anything else to do. Right. And you went and you started doing a couple of new clients. What was the real draw that said, you know what? This is more important to me than this nightclub thing? Like. Like, hey, I've done my nightclub thing. I. I pursued that a little bit. What was it that you missed? Because it wasn't the Salesforce dashboard.

It wasn't the Salesforce dashboard? No, I think it was the. It was kind of what I just said, like, seeing people.

Have the realization that the dream that they left everything for is actually going to work.

Yeah. Yeah.

That's like, that's what I really love. And I think that that. That kind of. That's on the company level, the founder level, and then even, like, the individual contributor level, there was. There was Actually, a rep that I was working with at one of my clients that texted me a photo the other day of the little part on her computer next to the mouse tracker. And it was just a post it, which was written in big block letters. Run underline, underline, underline, exclamation point, exclamation point. And that was from when we were. I had all of the reps do their own QBRs where they would present their. Their results and then their areas for improvement and then their own personal goals for the next quarter. And that was what she came up with, one quarter. And I loved that for her because when we started working together, she was like, you know, a really good girl. And she's like, I'm just doing my job, and I want all my clients to like me. And it's really important that, like, I check all the boxes and, like, do what everybody wants me to do. And for her to have that transition where she was like, it, I'm all in. It made me so happy. And even that she texted me that a couple of years later, she's like, oh, I just brought out my old computer and I. And I remembered this. I just love seeing people have those. Those moments because they've already taken such a risk to get there.

Yeah. I think I really love what you just said, too, is, you know, it feels like the difference between good salespeople and great salespeople are ones who do make that recognition of, I need to stop checking all these boxes based on their expectations of me are right. And then find the right boxes for everybody. Right. Because you still have to.

Yeah.

Certain steps. But, you know, you. You know, it's moving away from that. I want them to like me too. I want them to respect me, which doesn't mean being a jerk. Right. And, you know.

Right.

You know, pushing back a little bit. I love that. So have one more question for you, and then I'll let Scott ask a couple. But you said earlier, you know, that you. You really sort of work with clients that, you know, not the first million. Right. There's some little milestone they've hit. Right.

1.

I'm curious what you think those specific milestones are. And then in general, this is always a fun topic. When do you think a client has product market fit?

Oh, gosh.

So those are two really good questions. So in terms of the first one, the first question is, what are those milestones? Like, what are the things that people should be.

Yeah. What are the things where you're like, oh, they're a good client for me. Because they've achieved this part.

Right?

So I think that the, like the milestones that, that companies go through and they're roughly correlated to revenue, but there's some fuzziness because you could be selling like a wildly expensive product. I'm working with a company right now that like, their contracts are 300,000 to 1.2 million, and that's like a pilot for them. So if they have 2 million in revenue, it's not the same as someone who's selling like an 80k SaaS. So I think that the milestones are like your first 10 customers, and those are not going the way you get your first 10 customers, is not going to be the way that you get the next 10 and the next 50. But it's really important to get those first 10 and do it in a way that follows some sort of process. And then there's your next 10, like unaffiliated customers. That's your second milestone. It's like, can you sell to people who have. They have no network in common with you and they've never heard of you before. They're really just responding to the way that you're messaging your product and your value. And then I would say the next milestone is being able to train somebody else to be successful within the sales process that you've been running.

And then. Yeah, and then it just kind of scales from there. I mean, there's so many. Right. Like in the, in the growth of a company.

So, and so when, you know, and it's always, it depends. Right. But product market fit, like sometimes you can talk to people, they think they've done 5 million or 10 million and they think they've got product market fit, right?

Yeah.

And that's not always the case. Like, how do you, when do you think there's. Is it revenue? Is it number of customers? Is it after they've been around two or three years and they can see their renewal. Right? Their, their net revenue retention. Like, what's that look like?

Yeah, I mean, I think, I think NRR has to be the. If you had to pick one metric with which to, to measure product market fit, it would have to be like nrr. And then I would also marry that with a number of customers because again, like, if you're telling me that you only have five customers, but they're all renewing with you and, you know, maybe even some of them are expanding, okay, that's great. But are there like 500 more of those? And do you have a way that you can easily get them? So what I look for is like nrr, rough number of customers correlating to revenue. And then also like how repeatable is your process?

If, if you have to have NRR to have product market fit, then by default are we saying you can't know if you have product market fit until at least one year after you've brought people?

Yeah, yeah.

I think it's an important point that I just want to, just want to clarify.

Yeah, a hundred percent. I, I do believe that or whatever point at which you're renewing your contracts. Like, I mostly work with people who are selling to the enterprise. So for a lot of them, the first customers that they'll sign up, they'll do like a six month pilot. You have to see if those people are now committing to stay with you.

Yeah, I think most people, most founders assume they have product market fit when they get somebody to do a six month trial.

The money. Yeah.

How many times I hear, do you know how many times I hear we have, we have 25 customers right now? And I'm like, sweet. How many of those are on a trial versus paid? And they're like, they're all on, on a trial. And I'm like, all 25 of those are on a free trial. They're like, yes.

Oh gosh.

I'm like, oh, so. And you think you have product market fit because of that?

Well, they don't even have customers.

They don't even have customers.

No, of course not. Of course not.

Yeah.

It's an interesting point because I think if you asked if we did like a survey of a hundred founders right now and we said, you know, how many customers do you have? And they all have around 20, they would all probably say, yes, I think I have product market fit.

Yes. I think that product market fit back.

To them and said, well, how long have they been customers of yours? Probably none of them in the early stage would say more than a year. So.

No, definitely not.

There's a disconnect there.

There's a huge disconnect there. And I think that the, the shift is like most in most founders who haven't done it a bunch of times before think that product market fit is something that you have until it's proven that you don't. And I think it's really the opposite. You should assume, you should assume nothing until you've really proven that those are your ideal customers and they will stay with you and they're using your products.

I like that.

And I think the reason, the reason that people don't do this, it's a really, it's just a big, A big part of it, I think is just fear. Like in sales, we talk a lot about people having happy years. And like, the first time that somebody says, like, oh, that's, that would be useful, they're like, great, amazing. They're going to buy. The dark side of having happy ears is a fear of hearing. No. Like, you know, you've created this thing and you've put it out into the world and you've invested millions of dollars in building it and you, like, the fear of rejection that is built in. That process can be pretty extreme if you don't actively attack it. And so it's like, yeah, you want to hear that people love your product, but you also desperately do not want to hear what people don't about it or why they wouldn't use it. But the thing is, is that those things are going to come out in the wash regardless. And you should be having those conversations, like, as early and as often as possible. I do a lot of work with customer success teams now because, you know, a lot of companies are realizing, of course, that like, that's where their, their biggest pile of money really lies. And the number of times that they'll ask me, like, well, but like, what if something isn't going well? Like, what if they're not using the product? Or what if they had a problem? We don't. Should we, like, talk to them about that? And I'm like, yes, you should talk to them about that. You're gonna, you, you wanna do a renewal, right? Like, you think it's not gonna come up if you just like, don't talk, like you need to talk. You could call them right now, like, have a conversation, figure out how you're gonna fix it. It's not gonna get better in the next seven months with you not doing anything.

There's no magic fairy do.

There's no magical unicorn fairy dust.

Sadly, no.

Don't you think that one of the reasons.

That they're. That founders sort of say that they have product market fit before they do is because the system has made them have to lie about this in order to get funding for the first time, to raise funding the next time? I mean, what am I going as a founder? What am I going to go do? I, I'm looking to raise money, let's say, okay, and Richard's the VC, and, and I'm like, look, I got 25 paying customers, but I don't have product market fit yet because nobody's been around for a Year. That's not the story that the VCs want to hear.

No, it's not. No. They want to hear. Even.

Even when it's factual. That's not the story they want to hear. So I think that the system has made it so founders have to kind of lie about it or really just believe that they do have product market fit. Because I have enough customers that somebody gave me money to fund my business.

Yes.

So therefore I have product market fit.

If people don't believe, they should go read the story of Theranos. Right. Elizabeth Holmes.

Yeah. You think that was the problem with therapy?

She got. She got. She got found guilty and is going to jail because she lied about the product roadmap.

Mm.

I do. So I do think it's. I think you're right, Scott. I think it is the system. And I also think that, like, everyone has to take responsibility within that system. Right? Like, there's a. There are a lot of VCs and a lot of private equity firms that will give you bad advice. And I think it's also, like, at the end of the day, as a founder, it's your company. Dude, Dude. Like, you are steering this ship. You know, if you're getting bad advice or if you feel like you have to lie or misrepresent your company to a dangerous degree in order to get funding, maybe you should be looking at, like, different investors or like a different funding model, or you should be seeking out advice on how do you tell that story in a way where it's like a positive for you, you know, Like, I think it is also okay in our.

The right answer. The right answer.

Yeah.

I've got 25 paying customers. We don't have product market fit yet because none of them have been around for a year. I haven't had a chance to measure our nrr. And the fact that I just said that to you, Mr. VC Richard Harris, shows that I'm in the top 1% of the 1% of all early stage founders, because I actually know that.

A hundred million percent. And then also in the process of getting those. Those 25 customers, these are the groups that we talked to and we tried and we decided not to go with. And so we have a rough hypothesis right now that, like, this ICP is the one that we're going for and this is why. And then this is when we'll know if that's true for sure. And then if it's not true, this is what we're going to do.

I can see Scott Stack coming in and the first slide says why you shouldn't give me any money. And then that's not a bad strategy. Right.

Like that's, there's actually, there's someone that did that and they posted about it on LinkedIn recently and it was a really big company. I'm gonna remember what it was and I'm gonna send it to you guys. But it was like the very first slide was like all of the reasons why this is probably a bad idea.

Yeah.

And then of course they countered all those things.

These are all the reasons why we're gonna fail.

These are all your objections. Now let's talk about the positive. So.

Exactly.

I actually so many people like to call out all the quote unquote, bad sales advice from consultants and sales leaders and whatnot, but nobody ever calls it out from VCs, all the bad advice that they're throwing around. Screwing people up.

Yeah. And it's, that's where really a lot of it is coming from. I think a lot of consultants that are not doing good work, it's because they don't know how to challenge their customers. They don't know how to challenge the company's core assumption about what they should be doing. Like, I have a company right now that has been told by their board that they just need more volume. And I mean they don't even have pilots. Like they are nowhere. They're two years away from having product market fit. But they're having a lot of conversations and their board is like, great. You're having like, you've got like five ops in your pipeline and they're all really big, really slow moving ops. So we just need to see more volume. You guys need to start doing outbound. This is a terrible idea. They don't know who to talk to. They don't know what they're going to say. They don't even have like data. They don't even have lead data. They don't even have a tool to do it with. They're going to spin their wheels for like four months trying to figure this out and it's going to, it's going to suck. And then if you're like a mediocre consultant, you get, you know, in touch with a company like that and you're like, oh, okay, cool, I can help you do outbound. Oh man, you guys have no idea how to do outbound. Let's make you some messaging and let me show you you how to set up Apollo, etc. Etc. But it's based on nothing like a really good consultant. Is. Is like, okay, let's have a. A really serious conversation about, like, why you guys think that this is what you should be doing right now and are you willing to not do it? Because if you're not willing to not do it, then I don't think that I can help you. Because even if we do all the things right, like, this isn't really what you guys need right now.

100%. 100%. We. Look, that's the best part about, I think the roles we're in is we. We get to have those brutally honest conversations in a, you know, in a polite way, but sort of say, yeah, this isn't the right thing. And then, you know, sometimes they don't care and they'll still pay us. So, you know, I'm not going to turn down the check, but what are.

Like, the biggest things that you guys are seeing right now that people want to do that you're having to, like, talk them out of?

Before I answer that, I'm gonna go do a quick mid roll for our friends over at HubSpot.

Okay.

Come back and maybe we'll give you the mic to just start asking us some questions. So. Which is always good. It's always, you've made this episode super easy. So thank you. And you drop so much. Great knowledge. Oh, thank you, Hope Spot again, you know, if you want to go from being a contender, a pretender, to a contender, if you really want to become a legend in Q4 and you're not leveraging, you know, the different items in your sales stack like HubSpot, you're definitely missing some opportunities. So please be sure to go check them out. We appreciate HubSpot for putting us into the HubSpot podcast network. We are very grateful to them and all the support they've given us and some other amazing podcast friends in the sales and even the marketing world and some other places. So thank you. Check out HubSpot.com sales. So, all right, so your question, Monica, was what are people asking for? Yeah, miracles.

What are people asking for? You have to talk them out of.

Yes, yes. We are both.

I think it's kind of the same that it's always been, which is, tell us what we're doing wrong. Tell us, you know, and how do we do it faster? Right? Like, you know, it. It takes at least a year to get a good outbound process build. Right. This is not a thing. Right. And there's a, you know, so people then have to figure out, well, what's my economic impact and opportunity cost to do that versus if I took that same amount of money and created better content or created, you know, other things that could drive inbound or market recognition.

So I think it's always been that outbound is 10x more expensive than they think.

But they're under more pressure to get it because that's what everybody's telling them, right? That's what the VCs, the system is telling them. You got to move downbound because it's not working. You know, you got to get there faster. And it's kind of like, I get the idea of pushing. I think it's, the pushing is unrealistic. That's one thing. I think the, the, I think the same thing to you aligning with what you said is that they're, they're asking for help and they don't realize the help they need is explaining to the VCS that this is not realistic. And here's what is. Which is a, again, very scary to do. And I think for the three of us, it's, you know, it's easy for us to say that to somebody because, you know, we're not raising money and we're not, you know, responsible. I think those are the things that I, I think they're looking for. I do think they're also going back to. The good news is, is that people are in more of a growth mindset. Like, they are like, help me figure this out. They might not always like the answers that, that we have to give them, but they're open to figuring this out a little bit more than, than they were before. And they're finally finding. The tech founders are finally realizing that, no, a salesperson cannot just download the founder brain and make it work the same way because the founder thinks, you know, again, back to your point, because they did the first 10 customers, that everybody should be able to make it that easy. And they, that it was their title, it was the introductions, it was, they were warm, it was all that stuff. So that's what I'm seeing and hearing in addition to teaching my team, like, how do I get my team to just convert better on the opportunities we do have? How do I convert the funnel into the next conversation, the next step, and into close deals.

And why do you think that is? Like, what do you think happens? That people are more open to growth now or have more of a growth mindset? They're fucking scared in startup founder world.

Well, I mean, I think, and there's a lot of things like, you know, we have these overvaluations, right? We have unrealistic goals based on those valuations. We, they still have a hard time finding the quality salespeople. They've been told to cut and slash and burn everything.

And you know, they're being told to do, to do more with less, but nobody's ever taught them how to do it. And so they're very scared and they do want the council and they're open to it, you know, so I think that's different. I also, I can't tell if it's a generational thing like the founders today, particularly the tech founders, feel like they're a little bit more open than maybe the tech founders of five years ago. You know, the tech founders five years ago were.

Trying to understand the sales and revenue model, define the process, treating it like a process.

Salespeople like, you know, we're transactional and can be put in and put out and there's no big deal. I think there's more just knowledge out there on how to grow a business. So I think, I don't, that's, I have no idea if that's true. That could just be what my experience has been like the last five years. So.

I have a slightly different take. I think.

The, the things that I'm having to talk people out of doing that they want to do all the time is higher for industry expertise and Rolodex rather than their sales acumen. It's like a never ending battle will probably never defeat this demon, this dragon.

Yeah.

But it is shocking to me how many people still do this despite having me and other people in their ear telling them that's not a good move. The second thing is they refuse to believe that when you hire anybody in a sales and revenue role that speed of the hiring process is important.

They couch it. And we want to do our diligence. We're taking our time. We don't want to rush things. And I'm trying to explain to them salespeople move fast and we're dragging this process out for four weeks, six weeks, eight weeks. We assume that that's how you make every decision, which is you're not making a decision. So therefore I'm not going to be able to get anything freaking done when I come work for you. And so you're losing candidates by taking so long and not putting people through this process quickly.

Do you think that's happening?

Do you think people are losing candidates just because they're, you know, in the tech sales world there's a lot more people out there. Not, not that they shouldn't change their Process. But do you think they.

No, I don't think that's why. I just think they literally take forever. They don't know how to run a process with any kind of speed. And I don't know. I've never hired engineers. Maybe the speed with which you put people through a hiring process, on the engineering side, it doesn't matter. But on the sales and sales leader side, it matters. It matters a lot.

Yeah. Because we're running our candidate process. Like, if someone's looking for a job in sales or sales leadership, they're treating it like a sales process. They have their pipeline they're following up, and they're just like, okay, who. Like, who's moving through the pipeline?

Yeah.

And we've moved on. If you take too long, right. Then everybody thinks that they have an icp. Like, that is broad as hell always. So I'm constantly trying to tell them, just because you think you can sell to everybody at the beginning doesn't mean that you should. So that's something that they're all doing wrong, that I'm constantly kind of raging against.

And then the last thing is they all just want to go fast, fast, fast. And I'm constantly telling them that in order to go fast, you have to go slow first.

Yeah.

Slow down in order to go fast. If you just, like, Release a couple AES into the wild and have them do whatever to try to generate revenue, you might get a little bit of revenue, but you have no scalable process and system whatsoever that you can bank on. And the company that will win is the one who took some time up front to figure out who is our exact icp, what is our exact messaging that we need to lock in on. Right. And really understanding, like, the pains that the prospects go through. And we build out this, like, process, and now we have all this in place. Now we start running and eventually pass all these people who got a little bit of a head start on us.

Those are four things that I'm constantly trying to, you know, win the debate with. With clients and prospects and. And the like.

That's a really solid list.

Yeah.

I would also, I would say on your last point, like, not updating your icp, like, as you're learning more about your market and as it changes, you know. Yeah, it's a really big one.

All of these things should be kind of living, breathing entities rather than some static thing that's carved in stone. Like, your ICP evolves, your messaging evolves.

Yeah. Right.

You change as you learn.

So, yeah, it's interesting What I, what I took out of the last thing you said too, Scott, was, you know, some parts they need to go fast, some parts they need to go slow. They're putting their foot on the accelerator at the wrong place.

Yeah.

They're throwing bodies at the problem, you know, which is putting the accelerator on. But they're taking forever to hire a sales.

Yeah, they're slowing down on the straightaway and speeding up.

Right, Exactly. That's.

Exactly.

So that's great. What else you want to ask us? We're always happy to answer your questions, Molly.

Yeah.

So, Scott, you've been talking a lot about nearbound recently, which I love and I would love to know, like, what are the companies that you think are going to really crush it at this? And what are the ones that actually shouldn't even think about trying to implement it for like another five years?

Oh, that's the, that's very interesting.

The ones who are going to crush it are the ones who are incorporating it into what is still working right now. So they're not abandoning cold calling or cold emailing. If they're getting positive results and outcomes, they're supplementing it and sort of preparing for what I believe is an inevitability when those tactics don't work at all anymore. So they're building their network right now. They're putting in network growth as like KPIs. They're engaging with the cap table and advisors and influencers and whoever might be able to make intros. They're sort of learning the motion right now, studying it and implementing it in low friction kinds of ways. Those people are going to win because they'll have a massive head start. People that don't need to focus on near bound right now.

I think are people that are in markets where they're not seeing the same diminishing returns of cold calling and cold emailing. Let me, let me try to give you an example. Let's say we're trying to call real estate agents and sell them something. Real estate agents, for better or for worse, still live and die on their cell phone.

Yeah.

So they pick up the phone a lot more than a tech CEO does. Right, Right. Let's say we're trying to sell to small businesses like, like a local gym or, you know, a holistic like practitioner or whatever. Those people have office lines still and, or somebody answering the desk phone. Right. So you're getting pickup rates that mirror, for the most part the mid 2000s when you and I were coming up, you know, learning how to sell and cold Call. So you don't have to abandon those strategies for nearbound right now because those business owners are still using these communication tools of yesteryear, whereas in tech and B2B we're abandoning those things. I don't know about you, but my phone is. The ringer is off.

Do not disturb all the time. Yeah.

Right. So if I'm trying to prospect you, cold calling you is not going to work.

It's not. No.

But if I was trying to prospect your nightclub, for example, somebody is at that nightclub probably from 4:00pm to you know, 2:30am yeah. The right time to call them is probably about 5pm, 5.30pm when they're just like getting organized. They're there, somebody's there, somebody's probably going to pick up the phone or if.

You DM on Instagram, someone's going to answer.

Yeah.

That's their job.

I think there's certain industries that don't need to.

Prepare for it as soon as others, I guess is what I'm.

I love the, the framing of like the industries that are seeing diminishing returns and I, I think that sadly those are probably going to be the ones that are going to be the slowest to adopt it because they had something that was working at one point.

Yeah. And those are the people that. Those are the people that you see.

Like the ADPs of the world.

Yeah.

And these are the people that.

Yeah.

Getting the most pissed off about, you know, this chatter about near bound and totally diminishing returns of cold calls and stuff like that. It's like they're so heavily invested there and they don't have the modern kind of mindset or personnel to adopt this new stuff. Like I get it. They're pissed off, they feel threatened, they're backed into a corner and you know, the claws come out. I get it. But that doesn't make them right.

That's totally right. Yeah. Just because your whole career was built on doing things this one way doesn't mean that you get to still do that.

Right. I mean our career was made on cold calling.

Yeah.

All three of us. Right. So totally scary for me. You don't think it's scary for me to look into the future and be like, what am I going to do? What value do I provide in a world that doesn't have this like we all have to learn and adopt and change or we have to get out.

Of the game a hundred percent.

Yeah.

Well, I think that scares a lot of people.

Yeah. It's just, I think so too, channel model. You know, the channel existed in a different way than it does now. Right. There were, you know, the, the, you know, the resellers and, you know, distributors and all that stuff. You know, that all is shifting into this near bound world. Even though they, they will think they're the same thing. You know, the big companies who've done channel for decades think nearbound is nothing new other than a buzzword. Right. But there's a lot of nuance between.

It because it's a different way.

Yeah, you know, I'm sold today, I know how it works. But it's different because nearbound's more about the personal relationship where the channel is still a, a pray and spray, spray and pray approach. Right. So they haven't figured out that nuance yet.

I think so, yeah. And building relationships looks, looks different now. Right? Like, I guess if we take the ADP example, like, you're sure they've been taking people golfing and doing that for years and years and years, but that's not necessarily how people form relationships now. Like if you look at Gen Z and millennials that are the decision makers of today and tomorrow, they want to spend their time in a different way. And they're not like, oh God, please let me get out of the office and go to lunch with this sales. They're not even in an office. I know you have feelings about that, but you know, you have to think about, you have to think about value in a relationship in a different way.

That's that, that point that you just made is the most important point in the distinction between, yes, anal and near about.

I think the millennials and the Gen Z see companies like ADP or Paychex and you know, Fortune as the same way. They, they see their grandparents or parents who still want to read a newspaper. They're like, I don't know that. Because that's why did. There's a better, faster way. I think that's the disconnect to.

Monica. We are. This flew by. This was fascinating. Awesome. It really did so much good content. How can people get a hold of you?

They can find me on LinkedIn. Monica Stewart on LinkedIn. I post there every single day and I respond to all of my dms. Unless you're trying to sell me copywriting or lead generation services.

I would agree. I, you know, I love responding to the ones who say I have a really amazing profile and a fabulous career.

You're like, thank you. I do. Finally someone realized.

Thanks so much, Monica for joining us. And we'll see everybody next time on the surf and sails podcast.

Thanks, Monica.

Thanks, guys. Bye.