ultraman

Shepherd

Advice from savages selling App Development, Software or Web Design/Dev Sales

Mulling an opportunity to leave a sales position in tech hardware and transition to a similarly sized company who develops apps, custom software and does web design/dev. I will be their first devoted salesperson in their company. I've been given a 90 day ramp-up period and we've agreed on a 50K per month quota to start beyond that.

I am carrying a lot of connections with business potential, which will help, but really want to get some savage advice on cold prospecting for sales on the software side. Mostly curious about what positions yield the best engagement (i.e. CTO), typical sales cycle length, is engagement quantity over quality etc.

Of the 3 products I will be focusing on, this is the area I am zero experience in, so whatever you have to offer I'd be grateful for the advice.

🎈 Mentorship

🔎 Prospecting

👑 Sales Strategy

19 comments

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CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

See earlier threads today talking about not wanting to be the first and only AE.

ultraman

Tycoon

Shepherd

Can you drop a link here? I searched “only AE” and “Only Salesperson” and nothing relevant popped up.

braintank

Politicker

Enterprise Account Executive

Try searching for "Series A"

https://bravado.co/war-room/posts/why-joining-that-series-a-is-a-bad-idea

https://bravado.co/war-room/posts/somewhat-comprehensive-guide-to-avoiding-a-toxic-startup

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ultraman

Tycoon

Shepherd

Will do.

UrAssIsSaaS

Arsonist

SaaS Eater

See threads linked below for a lot of really good discussion on this.

WIthout knowing anything about the company you are joining there is a GIGANTIC red flag you put in here.

Your selling to CTOs but have a monthly quota and only 90 days ramp?

Mi amigo you are FUCKED. Selling that type of software to that ICP is gonna take you a hell of a lot longer than 90 days. You starting from scratch in every single way. its a new industry, new product, new sales cycle, new ICP, etc. Why did they give you a monthly quota? Youre fucked before you even start.

Beyond any and all of that, do they have any customers that fit the ICP you ill be targeting? If so, how many? How did they win them? How long did that take? How much are they worth.

I have so many questions and so little hope.

poweredbycaffeine

WR Lieutenant

☕️

If you have never been the first, don't try to be the first with a company that you have 0 experience with the products they sell. You're going to be very upset, very fast.

If you still want to--find and work with a mentor.

ultraman

Tycoon

Shepherd

The software component is one of 3 products they offer, it’s my only dark spot, the other 2 I have sold and or designed for many years on my own. Will certainly look into mentorship situation. Thx

ultraman

Tycoon

Shepherd

The point of this post was entirely missed.

All I was looking for was some insight to cold-prospecting software solution based sales. As I said before, the other things I will be selling, I have had a lot of experience with, it’s just this one thing.

I owned my own sales dependent business and was the sole “AE” for 17 years until I went bust because of the pandemic. So being a Lone Ranger is nothing to me, it’s like breathing. I will look to add people to this team in time. I am not looking for career advice at all.

I was just trying to avoid wading through the drivel of LinkedIn “Influencers” or random Google searches on the topic. So if you have some posts to point to here or general advice, I’d love to hear it.

braintank

Politicker

Enterprise Account Executive

Did you already accept the offer?

ultraman

Tycoon

Shepherd

No, but I am leaning that way.

ultraman

Tycoon

Shepherd

As offers go it is solid. They matched my base pay, similar benefits and the commission rate is WAY higher than my current position.

braintank

Politicker

Enterprise Account Executive

But you're the first and only AE at a company with no track record entering an industry you know nothing about. How do you know their shit even works?!?!?!?!

UrAssIsSaaS

Arsonist

SaaS Eater

Youre brain is about to explode. Go take a lap my friend.

ultraman

Tycoon

Shepherd

The owner of the company has been handling sales, they have been in business for 5+ years. They have multiple accounts with annual Billings of 2 mil+

UrAssIsSaaS

Arsonist

SaaS Eater

How did they win those accounts? And how many is "multiple"?

ultraman

Tycoon

Shepherd

They are full stack developers. They aren’t selling a specific type of software to a specific industry. That’s part of the appeal. I’ve spent the last year selling high precision test hardware in a component challenged world and managed to become one of the top sales people in our company, with 0 corporate sales experience in my life.

When I mentioned CTO‘s, that was just an example. I was mostly looking for some strategy to cold prospect for software solutions. I guess I’ll dig around here or just Google it.

The sales force is strong with me, just looking for a little insight here.

Pachacuti

Politicker

They call me Daddy, Sales Daddy

What are you leaving?
Do you have expertise in this new area which will accelerate ramp?
90 days...as mentioned by others, ain't much time. Is there a "perform or die" date?
Are they providing 100% of the leads or are you self-generating?
What happens when you exhaust your current connections in the first 30-60 days?

E_Money

Big Shot

💰

Never be the only AE! Unless it's your company.

SADNESSLieutenant

Politicker

Officer of ♥️

talk to us about what industry specifically it's in, typical deal cycle, who is the ICP, who is the Target customer

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