Salessavage101

Enterprise Account Executive

Account Planning Help for a new AE

I've finally graduated from an SDR role, (thank god) to an AE role. I'm currently drinking from the firehouse trying to not only understand the technology itself but make account plans. I'm having issues finding the following information. I realize that you'll find this info in different places depending on the account, but according to all of you sales savages out there, what are some of the best places to look for this information?

Account info needed:

Overall IT Budget
Count of VMs
IT Strategic Priorities
List of their different IT Divisions / Departments
Technologies they use across the divisions and categorized by on-prem, cloud, Applications

Some tools I have access to:

LinkedIn Sales Nav
ZoomInfo
Salesloft
The internet...

Your advice is very much appreciated

xoxo

the strugglebus

🔎 Prospecting

👑 Sales Strategy

☁️ Software Tech

9

20 comments

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braintank

Politicker

4

Enterprise Account Executive

An oft-overlooked source is job postings. Where they're hiring will tell you where growth is. Job postings are also full of insider acronyms & terms and usually include reporting structure. Plus the qualifications will tell you what tech they use (e.g. need 5 years experience with Cisco ASA)

Salessavage101

Good Citizen

1

Enterprise Account Executive

This info is great, keep the tricks and tips coming

RealPatrickBateman

Politicker

4

🔪Amateur Butcher🔪

This, and the linked threads should answer almost all of your questions, thoroughly and concisely.

<removed post>

Now thank your lord and savior @CoorsKing

CuriousFox

WR Officer

2

🦊

Kiss the ring peasants

Sunbunny31

Politicker

2

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

I use Builtwith to get a snapshot of the tech.

Annual reports can help with strategic direction, LOBs/departments and other info (are they projecting growth or loss for the upcoming year? Challenges they are facing?).

CuriousFox

WR Officer

3

🦊

Doesn't ZoomInfo have tech info?

braintank

Politicker

1

Enterprise Account Executive

Both do. Depend on what you're selling. Builtwith is good for telling you what tech is running their website (e.g. here's bravado: https://builtwith.com/?https%3a%2f%2fbravado.co%2f) whereas Zoominfo will tell you enterprise tech (e.g. SAP, Salesforce, etc.)

CuriousFox

WR Officer

1

🦊

Thank you for this! I'm still learning ZI in general.

braintank

Politicker

1

Enterprise Account Executive

I find it very difficult to use. Primarily use it to move people I find on LinkedIn to CRM.

Salessavage101

Good Citizen

0

Enterprise Account Executive

Thanks for reccomending Builtwith, finding this extremely helpful.

Is this data from Builtwith valid? Do you find that it's mostly accurate?

Pachacuti

Politicker

1

They call me Daddy, Sales Daddy

Good luck finding all that info. Seriously...good luck.

If you were an SDR for that company, you should have a grasp of the technology and the driving factors as to why someone would purchase. If you don't...

Regardless, not knowing the sector you're selling into and the exact technology makes knowing what you need to know -vs- what you want to know difficult. That said, if you are doing that kind of pre-sales call research I would try to talk to someone worked or works at the company. All the info you're talking about is insider type of info - not readily available on the internet, even if its a gov't entity.

And you can get a lot of that info in an initial Discovery call if you know how to ask it correctly.

Salessavage101

Good Citizen

1

Enterprise Account Executive

Switched companies. We partnered with the company I work at now, so I knew surface level info but not as much as I need to know now as an AE

SADNESSLieutenant

Politicker

0

Officer of ♥️

Zoominfo has filters for this, technographics, might be an added feature or not, lmk if u find it

lol the struggle bus

Notmyrealname

Politicker

0

AE

Do you really need all that info? Why?

Salessavage101

Good Citizen

2

Enterprise Account Executive

Great question, my manager seems to think so

braintank

Politicker

1

Enterprise Account Executive

You can only get so much from public materials. You learn most of this stuff talking to people in and around the account. Everyone will say "read the 10-K" but having read dozens (if not hundreds) they're largely boilerplate.

TennisandSales

Politicker

0

Head Of Sales

it might help if you cant find certain pieces of information dig into the account and find the people you think you could get that info from if you were able to get them on the phone,

DungeonsNDemos

Big Shot

0

Rolling 20's all day

Do all the other AEs on the team have this info for their accounts?

Justatitle

Big Shot

0

Account Executive

Crunchbase may have some of this info along with Clearbit. I have heard mixed reviews of clearbit FWIW

justatopproducer

Politicker

0

VP OF SALES -US

Have conversations about this with the account.

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