How do I stay positive when everyone is "failing"

Ok so the short of it is my company is struggling big time when it comes to a repeatable process to generate new pipeline/revenue. Our tech is such where a rep can hit his yearly number in 1 year, and last year 2/4 reps hit. We are now up to 8 reps, and those 2 that hit last year are still the only ones having success.


I've reached out to them individually for ideas/guidance, but it seems like it's less about their process as again, they've each now done it basically twice while everyone else hasnt.


I know its a long term plan, and I've only been here for 3 months. But it's tough staying positive when 2 weeks go by, no new revenue created, and my boss is asking me what the plan is (spoiler alert...he has no ideas).


So my question, is how do I continue going into 1 on 1s, etc, knowing that I'm failing miserably and have no bright new ideas to crack the egg? In past roles like this, my frustration has boiled over to the point where I come off as disgruntled, which isn't what you want on a sales team.


(Side note - our company is still growing at a pretty sizable rate, if I last a year my equity alone is worth over $100k, likely more, so I'm not looking to hop. Just looking to succeed, and in leu of that, survive).

👑 Sales Strategy
💆‍♂ Mindset
📠 Startup
11
antiASKHOLE
Tycoon
4
Bravado's Resident Asshole
Have you tried to sit down with those reps then? They may be able to help you if your manager won't be able to.
FeelItInMyPlums
Valued Contributor
1
Sales Account Executive
Sat down with each rep and took a page from their book. The short of it seems to be there isn't a consistent, repeatable plan, and you have to sort of luck into the right account.
antiASKHOLE
Tycoon
2
Bravado's Resident Asshole
I see your reservations with wanting to stay, but damn, just sounds like there isn't any type of structure or system for success. How do they plan to scale when they have 2 guys that are the secret and the manager doesn't even know said secrets.
CuriousFox
WR Officer
3
🦊
Ok but your manager should know and be giving you guidance. Wtf?
FeelItInMyPlums
Valued Contributor
0
Sales Account Executive
Manager got hired a month after me. He's figuring it out as he goes. Currently he works from England as he is doing a workcation type thing.
bandabanda
Tycoon
1
Senior AE Mid Market
Sorry, but that's kind of a red flag for me right there. If the manager is new, and sales overall isn't hitting revenue goals and the sales leader is doing the whole nomad thing? I've worked at small companies/startups and that's not sustainable for that manager unless he can turn things around remotely. I know that doesn't help you much but just something I would keep an eye on frankly.
bandabanda
Tycoon
0
Senior AE Mid Market
Also, the other reps giving you no guidance sounds like BS to me. They are truly doing nothing consistently and just purely getting lucky, or they just aren't willing to share. There is almost ALWAYS things you can do consistently and repeatedly that will drive results...just takes time.

I understand your frustration and I would be getting frustrated too. In sales all you can control is your inputs - it's a blessing and a curse because you can't control the outcome but at the same time you can know beyond a shadow of a doubt you gave it your all too. That's what I would do - see if you can ask the top reps more specific questions that you might have missed (daily routine, prospecting process, messaging, etc) then do those daily routine things consistently. Make the dials, send the emails, tweak your messaging. The goal is in your conversations with your manager you can proactively say "I know what we talked about last time, here's what I've done and AM DOING to help produce better results."
Pachacuti
Politicker
2
They call me Daddy, Sales Daddy
I work with a real “Debbie downer”. I don’t like talking to him cause everything is always negative. Lesson learned - don’t be him.
iamtheone
Executive
2
Enterprise SDR
Might be a no brainer but can you check crunchbase for competitors? Check the reviews on G2 and see what problems competitors have solved and see if the same can be done for your own products.
jefe
Arsonist
2
🍁
Others like @antiASKHOLE, @CuriousFox, and @Kosta_Konfuciusbasically covered it.

Try not to get bogged down - hope it gets better.
Kosta_Konfucius
Politicker
0
Sales Rep
What is your sales cycle length? What is the tenure for the other 4 new reps is it also 3 months? If the average sales takes 4 months I wouldnt be putting this much pressure on yourself this early.

There is going to be a ramp up period which can take some time bringing in net new revenue.
FeelItInMyPlums
Valued Contributor
0
Sales Account Executive
sales cycle is 6-8 weeks "once the client has a project." Other 4 reps were hired just after me, but some have had trivial success whereas I've had 1 positive progressing.

Seeing as most of our stuff comes from cold outreach, it likely takes a lot longer than that. And I'm ok with the idea of a 6ish month ramp....but you can't say that out loud.
Sunbunny31
Politicker
1
Sr Sales Executive 🐰
What's your ICP?
revenuegenerator
Praised Answer
0
Sales Management
Look at where you struggle in the sales process. Is it getting people to schedule initial qualification calls with you? Is it getting those qualification calls to commit to a demonstration?, Etc. Start there + Ask for advice about that.

You can't look at it holistically like "I just can't hit quota, how can I fix that?". You have to break down the overall task into the most granular components. Find the bottlenecks you're individually having and work on remedying those.

Any sales mgr worth his salt should be able to help you with this.
Epictetus
Valued Contributor
0
SaaSy
Ok, so I have been where you are and it sucks. There are some great companies out there that can help you build pipe with AI. Outside of throwing money at the problem, I'd recommend doing some post-mortem evaluations on the closed-won deals that are thriving and closed-lost deals that a reasonable person thought were going to close. Then compare the reasons and build your own ICP. Idk if you're doing your own prospecting, but use your ICP to do it. Things to look at would be: funding; hiring trends toward a department that you sell into; Linkedin posts with hashtags talking about your buying factors; job postings (they show you what people are required to do in that position and it is legit the best persona indicator). I'm happy to share more. Good luck! Oh, this will take you about 20 hours. If you do it after hours and on the weekend, you'll be good to go. DM me if you want other suggestions.
Tazmanian
0
AE
This is probably going to sound like a dumb idea but have you talked to the customers that have bought from you? It sounds like you've asked your reps and they assume it's luck or at least not repeatable. Seems unlikely that there are an infinite or random number of specific reasons why customers who actually bought from you did.

If you can get that information, could point you in the right direction.

My 2cents (at half price)
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