From AI Search to Revenue: Building the AI Sales Pipeline

I gotta, I gotta first start by saying I am such a fan, Gerhard, of Selling Power magazine. I was telling you in our green room conversation that back in the days of building Gateway computers, as we went from a small company to a multi billion dollar company, I was buying 10 copies of selling Power a month and then it was 20. And I think at one point I was ordering 50 copies a month to distribute among my sales leaders. And it became a pivotal piece to help us grow and scale from, you know, a small company to over 11 billion in revenue. So I got to tip my cap to you and Mark Hunter, of course. You're one of my virtual heroes and one of my virtual board members. You don't know that, but you do now because I read your stuff and I listen to what it is you say. So I have to first say thank you and it's an honor to be here.

Thank you. Take it away, Gene.

All right, so we're going to talk about a sales pipeline and, and the title here is the next seismic shift in B2B sales. In 2018, I launched my first sales book that became a bestseller and all that fun stuff. But the first chapter I Talked about was 2018 timeframe the seismic shift of B2B sales. I've heard many of the experts that have been on these panels echo the same thing that we moved into a situation where buyers had more power than the sellers, meaning the buyers had access to information, technical data sheets, anything from your website, anything that was published on Google. And what we had to do was shift the way that we sold in the B2B world, knowing that leading with features and benefits and hoping you made a sale was not the way it was going. What we determined and what everybody knows, if you've been in this game for a long time, is that the great sellers don't lead with features and benefits. Your customers already know this stuff for you, your competitors and anybody else in the marketplace. But you lead to those features and benefits. We're going to talk for the next 10 to 15 minutes of what I think is the an even bigger seismic shift, which is an answer engine optimization front end pipeline. Now, I've been known to be a business growth expert per se. That's what others say, but people say what is the key to record breaking growth? How did you help gateway go to 11 billion? How did you turn around 11 divisions at Tony Robbins? How did you sell successfully consult 164 Business to Business clients into record breaking growth? And the answer, as simple as I can make it, is what I call the aggregation of marginal gain. If you think about a typical pipeline or a typical funnel, I had to take a crack. So keep this generic. But for most companies you've got leads that come in, those leads get screened. Do we solve the problem that they have? They turn into an opportunity. It migrates to what you may call a discovery, an initial meeting. What I just simply call it as your first meaningful conversation that moves into being something productive. And you say I need to go gather more intelligence. I need to perform an audit, I need to perform a survey, I need to understand what I need to understand so that I can build you a solution based presentation. After that, if I had more room on this screen, it would be something, send a proposal, there'd be a conversion rate, there'd be an average sales price and there'd be an average, let's call it gross profit. But the whole idea of aggregation of marginal gains and what I'm saying to you is the same thing I say to CEOs on a weekly basis, which is imagine that if we had my big focus on every one of these areas and I know the data before we start and I say what is it that we need to do to increase our lead gen by 5%? How do we increase the conversion to opportunity by 5%? How do we move those opportunities to that first meeting? Increase by 5%? Because you know that not every opportunity turns into a first meeting. You call them, you call them too late, you don't follow up in an appropriate way. But the key to record breaking growth is not one thing, it's not winning that one big deal, but it's this marginal gain across 7 to 9 data points. That's really if somebody asked the secret to the success I've had, this is what it is because there isn't anything in your life, I think if you agree with me right now, that if you had 90 days of focus on any area of your life that you couldn't increase by 5%. So what does that have to do with what we're talking about now? Well, what we know to be true as you've listened to many of the experts that are here is that we are migrating from the current day search engine optimization. Pay per click, downloads from a website, form fills that all appear to be leads. And that is the world that we've morphed into. Knowing that this world is shifting. The new seismic shift is that people now are not going to sites. The Google Analytics are dropping tremendously because smart people like you are now using chat or they're using AI to ask questions, to put them in the best position to learn what they need to learn. It's called buyer intent. In fact, I was just telling Thomas Ross, over the last 10 days, I bought a Tesla without ever talking to a seller and without ever going to a website, did it all through AI to get down to the absolute detail of everything I wanted in that vehicle and even told me where to go to get it. That's buyer intelligence. I wasn't worried about if I was getting the best deal. I wasn't worried about if somebody was trying to snowball me. We all know the buying experience of buying cars and we know some of the perils around that. But this is the wave of what is happening. So the statement here is very compelling. Stop chasing buyers, start intercepting them based on intent. The old way, reactively generation mass email campaigns, contact us forms, inbound phone calls. And I'm not saying that's dead, but if you put your intelligent hat on, you know that's going to keep dwindling and keep dwindling because more and more smart people are going to start asking questions about what it is you do, how it is you do it, and they're going to do it on AI. Now how do you get in front of this big wave? How do you have proactive answer optimization? How do you show up and meeting them at the moment of the question and then how do you infiltrate, infiltrate this answer engine optimization wave? It's not pontification, it's already happening. And when Thomas and I were working through this, I'm like, I just bought an entire Tesla this way. And honestly, anywhere I go now, I'm not going to Google to find the great restaurant near me. I'm going into chat. I'm asking, chat who, what, where, when, why and how. Now imagine if that's you and you got sellers in the field, you got sellers on the inside and you see this buyer intent and that proactive call can go in at that moment. You, my friends, have the keys to the kingdom. So this is not a new tool. This is infrastructure shift. Those that get in the front of it are going to win faster. This is not my estimated guess of 38 years of being in B2B sales. It's not that. This is the wave and it starts with three elements. First you got to be visible. I'm going to go into all of these. You've got to optimize. And then you have what's called Agenic active activation. So it's a new revenue model where AI will identify, qualify and route those opportunities to your rep. Before your rep even say hello, imagine those coming into the front of your funnel. Imagine your inside seller. Imagine whatever your method is to communicate with prospective buyers, enhancing hugely. Let's first talk about visibility. One, you got to be present where your buyers are asking questions and when they're asking questions. Number two, you want to be at the top tier of AI answers. Now here's the good news for you. Our estimates show that only 3% of companies are actively AEO optimized, less than 3%. So you're on the front end of this wave if you're a business leader, if you're responsible for rev revenue, if you're responsible for sales, management and leadership. But we want to move to the top tier of these AI answers. And here's the truth. It's happening faster than we even realized. If AI does not see you, you're not going to exist. Once you become visible, then you move into the next piece, the answer engine optimization piece. That means structuring your brand data for machine readability and that's moving from keywords to trust vectors. Thomas talked about this in his keynote. That if somebody, if we can predict the questions that your average prospect or your average ideal client are asking, and when they ask those, you show up, you show up at the top. You show up as somebody that's giving them the information they need. And then simultaneously this goes into the front of your funnel and that proactive call happens. By the way, we're on a call with Mark Hunter, the sales hunter. He knows and he teaches speed is everything. Is that right Mark? Yes, it is. I had to open my mic up. Yes it is. Sorry to put you on the spot, man. I'm such a fan of your work, I'm almost saying the words that you say. And we want to teach AI how to recommend you. And then you go to the activation. So imagine now you have what's called real time detection of high intent. Somebody is asking the questions. It gets routed to a CRM, your internal mechanism and driver. Whether you have reps in the field, reps on the inside that handle these leads, you, they're notified, it goes right into the funnel and that proactive call comes out. So you've got automated qualifications. So it's not just a matter of being at the top, but if there's a level of community, bi directional communication, you can begin to ask, you can have your AI agent ask a few questions and actually begin to qualify the lead before a human gets involved. Always on 24, 7. Now, this is a big busy slide. We have currently 12 clients that are in this program with Velocity sales that we've been engaged with from 3 months to 12 months. These are the actual results that we're seeing. Number one, an increase in close rates. Why? Because if you compare close rates using AEO versus close rates of using today's technology of search engine optimization, pay clicks, pay per click and form fills. Just do the math. The only people coming into the funnel are the people that have asked the questions and have high intent. Naturally, conversion is going to increase. But here's the stat that really blew me away is the reduced sales cycle time. These people are likely already highly qualified. And because they're early adopters of chat and AI or whatever AI engine they're using, early adapters are usually more senior level executives, people like you that would be attending an event like this. You are people that desire and are on the forefront. So congratulations for that. But these companies are seeing right now higher average deal sizes of nearly 45%. That's an aggregate. Some are seeing 20%, some are seeing 80%. But we ran this math and I pressed on Thomas. I said only show the facts. And of course customer acquisition costs are lower because all you've got to do, you don't have to have more ad dollars going in. You don't have to do more revs on your website or create more landing pages. We're getting in front of the intent engine. There is no doubt this whole conference has been about this wave. Well, we're in the middle of the wave. So what does it look like for you? The competitor gap. Here's where we are right now and what we believe over the next 12 to 18 months. This is 12 those that get on the front of this answer engine optimization curve, meaning that they have already done the preparation. They already have had the ability to understand the top 100 to 125 questions that an ideal buyer would ask. Whether it's a C level folks, you know, anybody that could be on the buyer side or in the buyer's table of a B2B transaction, especially a large solution base six or seven figure deal, those are the folks that are on the front end and we want to be there. You want to be there before your competitors get there. The research is clear. Everybody will be there. At some point. It's undeniable. Everybody will be there. It's a matter of who is going to be the early adopter. Start walking the path of what AEO will do and you know, there's a couple of ways to do this. One says you're going to, you know, go this on your own. You're going to work with your IT team. And I see that that is a fruitful path, but it's a, it's a trial and error path that is clouded with multiple obligations by those people on your staff. And what Thomas has created as a partner with Selling Power and Gerhard and Mark Hunter is he said, I'm going to do a masterclass. Now, by the way, how did I meet Thomas? He was the keynote at an event, March of 2025 in San Diego. I was so impressed with it. We met, we became friends and he's been my guide and my mentor. So as I'm consulting companies here in the US and in Germany and in Finland, all of my clients are in front of this AEO situation and I'm having Thomas come in as the guide. But we are putting them well ahead of the curve in their worlds of high competition, low price competitors and the difficulty in getting to decision makers. So I'm seeing those personal results with my consulting clients and there's every reason that you should too. So we're putting together a masterclass. This is a three to four hour class and really what it's going to do for you is you're going to join a group of 10, nine other business leaders, senior level folks, and we're going to walk through each of these phases. This is not a teaching situation where you're going to sit at your desk. We're going to regurgitate what we know on a webinar. These are workshops. So that means, number one, you're going to go through a workshop. And what I would advise you to do is if you're the business leader, bring in your top folks, bring in your sales managers, bring in your marketing person so that you have a group of people there that can help answer the questions to understand how to map your top AI driven buyer questions. It's going to be different for every business, but it's going to be workshop style. We're going to teach, you're going to do, we're going to observe, we're going to coach. Secondly, we're going to look at your visibility gaps. Now there's a proprietary system built by Velocity Sales that will run this analysis not just for you and your company, but for you, your company and your competitors. You need to know where you stand and one of the greatest lessons that and simplest lessons you can get as relates to business growth or performance management or coaching and accelerating Leaders is this all change happens by telling the truth. All change starts by telling the truth. So you're going to map these buyer questions. Most of you are going to have between 100 and 125. And then we're going to use that Pareto principle of 20% of these questions produce 80% of the results. And we're going to show you how to double down and make yourself visible everywhere as it relates to AI. You'll also understand what your competitors are doing now. Now, in the four cases I've done this, all four of the companies, while some were as big as 300 million, some as small as 15 million, all four of those companies accidentally ranked in the top four, but none of them were number one. So they're all activated on this exact program. And the reason I asked Thomas to put this together is to say, how do we do this with people that are attending this Selling power magazine sales 3.0 situation? And the last piece you're going to leave with the last two pieces is you will leave there with your custom AEO strategy built and a 90 day implementation roadmap. It's a hands on working session. So it's not a video that you can watch and try to do yourself. We're going to put your feet to the fire, you're going to be able to ask the questions, but you're going to leave there with this strategy built. You will have the best foot forward ahead of anybody that you're competing with right now. And as I said, it's a working session. Now for those that decide to join, I'll show you the pricing and so forth. Obviously it's not free and frankly we would do this for free. But what I know from being in this event world and teaching world and workshop world is, you know, usually people don't pay, they don't pay attention. So we only have room for 10. Now if we get 20 of you sign up and you decide you want to do this now, which is crazy not to, then we're going to do two sessions. But we want to keep these small and intimate so all questions are answered and it's our outcome that you become the next great case study. That's really our incentive here. We're doing this for a fraction of what it would take for me to personally consult your business or Thomas Ross to do it. But we want to make sure everybody has this book in their hands before they attend. So we're putting at a ridiculously low rate. When Thomas asked me what I thought I should charge, we should charge for this. And I'm like, at least 2,000, maybe 3,000. And he said, no. He goes, we're here to get the case study. We're here to get the testimonial. So we're doing it for just 499. Now, here's the thing, but a pontification here. Maybe you can look at my background, Thomas's background. But I said, thomas, the only way we'll do this is that if somebody gets to the end of it and we didn't deliver everything it is they wanted and more, then we'll just give that money back. And he said, fine. So you have everything to gain, nothing to lose. We're going to do this first one on March 25th at 1:00pm Eastern. And depending on how many of you register, we're going to do two sessions, but we're not going to allow them to be more than 10. Because I believe the individual interaction, the individual coaching is worth its weight in gold. So that's the call to action there, men. What I know to be true, as you know, my background and working with Tony Robbins and some of the more famous people in this personal development world, every big name I've. I've had interactions with, is you are always going to get rewarded in public for the things you do in private. This is one of those private opportunities for you to get ahead of what everybody's going to be doing. First. Adapters are the winners. I'll take it over to Q and A now. I can see you all now, guys. Gene, thank you. Thank you.

You should do this professionally. You have a talent.

Well, I was going to apologize for my enthusiasm because Thomas and I were arguing. I said, that's too, That's. That is just too inexpensive. Because I know those of you that are still watching right now, every one of you have a corporate Amex that you could just plug in right now, no questions asked, and you put your foot down to do this. You know that what I find in every new technology breakthrough, those that do it first are the ones that win the most because they're carving out the new way they're doing things that others aren't doing. And what happens is the laggards catch up and they're scrambling. And that's why, you know, Thomas even laid it out. He said the early adapters that own this, that are putting the content out that matches the questions, they're target accounts, their best buyers, their icp, whatever it is you want to call it, there's. There's ICPs. But, Mark, you Know big deals. How many people are at the buyer's table in these big deals? In your world, Quite a few more than there ever used to be. But 4, 7, 10? Any of those folks could be the one that's doing the intel grab that are on chat saying, we have this problem I'm looking for. Show me who. That's how I do it when I buy things. So for you to come up and your brand to show up, and when you do that, this is. This is not hyperbole, these numbers. This is aggregation. And the reason I showed this slide, guys, is aggregation of marginal gain. 5%. 5%. 5%. 5%. Well, I think I am 100% certain that this puts this on steroids. This says 10%, 15%, 20%. Because the people coming in now are the leaders, people that are using the technology. They're usually more astute. They're usually higher on the buyer's table or the influence and authority network. You want to get those? But I'll pause now. Goes to the early adopters. Pardon my overenthusiasm for this subject. That's good. That's good.

Well, thank you. I have a new definition of the pipeline Gene. You made me think about this because your pipeline is the distance between where you are today and where you promised your board to be.

Yeah. That's beautiful. It's a beautiful way to put it. You know, one of the keys as a consultant, Mark knows this is. I'm a. I'm a maniac before I start about getting the baseline numbers. And that's usually, you know, if they've done a halfway decent job in their CRM, whether it's Salesforce, HubSpot, pipedrive, you name it. Once I understand this baseline and then you go to work, what do we need to do to get 5% more leads? How do we get more of those converted? Answer engine optimization puts this on steroids. And here's what I can tell you. Very few companies are even doing this today.

How long is the. The master class?

We're estimating it to be three and a half hours. And frankly, we're gonna stay until, you know, this will be our first time actually performing it for the masses. We've been doing it for individual companies. 12 of them as of now. 4 of them are brands that you would recognize in a second. These are. These are not, you know, manpass. These are billion dollar companies that the CMO specifically hired Thomas Ross and the Velocity team to come and build this. Once he ran the initial report and showed them where they really Are it was game over. Because then you go to the next phase of identifying the questions and the next phase of building the content to be ready to answer those very specified questions. You know, we had a case study where a very, very, very well known CRM company that if you've been around the block, you've been around for, let's just say 20 or 30 years in the world of professional sales, you would know this CRM brand. They contacted Thomas and Thomas went through his initial audit and it showed that this very famous CRM and if I said the CRM I won't because they're not doing so well. But Mark Hunter would go, oh yeah. And you know what? You probably say, Mark, are they still in business? Well, the answer is yes, they are still in business. Barely. And when this information, a senior level executive had us do this initial report, but when that information came to their cmo, who refuted it and was somebody that doesn't even use chatter, AI and kind of a, kind of an old schooler. It was such a shame because they were, let's just say they were a small to mid size CRM at one point. They were by far number one and they didn't even show up for small business or B2B CRM as it related to AI search. And they said okay, they wouldn't want it. And we said great, good luck. Because we want to work with people that want to win. We only build case studies when people win and break records. That's the goal. You serve people better than anybody else, they tend to stay with you and they stay loyal. That's the name of the game, my friends.

So Thomas just texted me that six people in the audience have requested information about it and nine people booked meetings with him.

It's a no brainer. We have built this for it to be a no brainer.

Wonderful. Well, fortunately our time is up. Jean, thank you so much for educating us on how to build a better and faster and richer pipeline with AI and work smarter, not harder.