Steffany Boldrini
steffbold@gmail.com
medium.com/@fiiine
 First sales job 10 years ago
 Founded my own startup
 MongoDB – top rep for 3 years – selling free software!
 Sauce Labs – top rep company wide
 Citus Data – sales director
 Always beat quota – not that hard – just doing my work!
 Respond fast (ideally within 5 min): your chances of converting
them into a customer are 9x
 Also, 35-50% of sales go to the vendor that responds first
Send questionnaire prior to call
 “Can you please send me the email addresses of your team members
and manager, so I can add them to the call and make sure we answer
their questions as well?”
 1. You get all stakeholders on the call – early on
 2. You are not only understanding everyone’s goals and requirements from the
beginning, you are also…
 3. Getting more contacts early on in case someone goes dark (or changes jobs,
or moves to another group, etc)
 Intros
 Review project goals (of your prospect)
 Demo (of your product)
 Q&A
 Next steps
(Why - to set expectations for the call)
• 20,000 customers!• Harvard dropouts
• $100M in funding
20,000 customers!Harvard drop outs
$100M in funding
 Background
 <Insert Relevant Company Information>
 Tests taking a week to run
 Running 10 tests at a time
 Potential Challenges
 <Insert Before/Negative Consequences>
 Some people not trained in Selenium / Apium
 Desired Outcomes
 <Insert Positive Business Outcomes>
 Run 1,000 tests in under 2 minutes
 Get team fully ramped in CI/CD
 Required Capabilities
 <Insert Required Capability>
 99.999% uptime
 Security
 How We Will Measure Success
 <Insert Metrics>
 Run 1,000 tests across 10 browsers without errors and < 2 minutes
 Integrate with your CI tools, and Slack
 Before
 Build new release for 6
months
 Launch
 Fix bugs
 Gather feedback for next
release
 Build next release for 6
months
 Now
 Agile methodology /
continuous delivery: active,
incremental, interactive
work – sprints
 Automated testing and
shipping to production
 Fast, small releases
 Immediate customer
feedback
 Fast iteration
 Stay competitive
 <Insert ‘How We Do It’ / ‘Better’>
 Only company that reliably allows you to run 5,000 tests in parallel
 Our core engineering team are Selenium and Apium contributors – you are working
with the best
 We have over 500 browser and mobile combinations for you to test on
 $1M revenue increase
went from 5 days to
< 3 minutes
 Gather POC requirements (proof of concept)
 Hands on session with the team – proof is in the pudding!
Right after the call: send email to everyone on the call (as well
as anyone that missed the call) with the info you promised
throughout the demo (i.e. use cases, relevant blog posts), and
review next steps / send invite to the next meeting
Follow up
Follow up
Follow up
 Email title: “Response requested: ______ ”
 Email: “It seems like now is not the best time for you, so I will go ahead and close your
acct”
 “Can you please do me a favor”
 CC others in the email
 TEXT!
 911 email – (see next page)
 Hi Zuck,
While I've tried to reach you, I haven't heard back from you and that tells me one of three
things:
1. You've already chosen another ______ for this and if that's the case please let
me know so can I stop bothering you.
2. You're still interested but haven't had the time to get back to me yet.
3. You've fallen and can't get up and in that case please let me know and I'll call 911
for you...
Please let me know which one it is because I'm starting to worry...
Thanks in advance and I look forward to hearing back from you.
Regards,
 Set agenda
 Get everyone in the meeting
 Do research on their business initiatives, tech stack
 Face to face is always best
 Tell a story: 63% of people will remember a story, 5% will remember stats “Macy’s
made $1M more per month when they added one more browser to their tests”
 Ask for their business: what would it take?
 You have control
 Show enthusiasm, no matter what: enthusiasm got me apartments in SF!
 Always review and schedule next steps. Email title: “Next steps____”
 Discount: always an odd #
 Increase # of blog posts: companies with 400 or more pages have 6x
more leads than companies with 50-100 pages. How? Simple: keep
track of all questions people ask you, then write a blog post answer for
each of them. Most people start their searches online anyway.
 Let customers buy what they need, don’t try to sell a huge enterprise
package with 10 different features when they only want 2 features, it’s
like you going to Nordstrom wanting to buy a nice pair of shoes, and
them telling you that you have to buy the entire outfit that you don’t
even think looks good!
 steffbold@gmail.com
 medium.com/@fiiine

How to Run the Perfect Demo for Founders

  • 1.
  • 2.
     First salesjob 10 years ago  Founded my own startup  MongoDB – top rep for 3 years – selling free software!  Sauce Labs – top rep company wide  Citus Data – sales director  Always beat quota – not that hard – just doing my work!
  • 3.
     Respond fast(ideally within 5 min): your chances of converting them into a customer are 9x  Also, 35-50% of sales go to the vendor that responds first
  • 4.
  • 5.
     “Can youplease send me the email addresses of your team members and manager, so I can add them to the call and make sure we answer their questions as well?”  1. You get all stakeholders on the call – early on  2. You are not only understanding everyone’s goals and requirements from the beginning, you are also…  3. Getting more contacts early on in case someone goes dark (or changes jobs, or moves to another group, etc)
  • 7.
     Intros  Reviewproject goals (of your prospect)  Demo (of your product)  Q&A  Next steps (Why - to set expectations for the call)
  • 8.
    • 20,000 customers!•Harvard dropouts • $100M in funding
  • 9.
    20,000 customers!Harvard dropouts $100M in funding
  • 10.
     Background  <InsertRelevant Company Information>  Tests taking a week to run  Running 10 tests at a time  Potential Challenges  <Insert Before/Negative Consequences>  Some people not trained in Selenium / Apium  Desired Outcomes  <Insert Positive Business Outcomes>  Run 1,000 tests in under 2 minutes  Get team fully ramped in CI/CD
  • 11.
     Required Capabilities <Insert Required Capability>  99.999% uptime  Security  How We Will Measure Success  <Insert Metrics>  Run 1,000 tests across 10 browsers without errors and < 2 minutes  Integrate with your CI tools, and Slack
  • 12.
     Before  Buildnew release for 6 months  Launch  Fix bugs  Gather feedback for next release  Build next release for 6 months  Now  Agile methodology / continuous delivery: active, incremental, interactive work – sprints  Automated testing and shipping to production  Fast, small releases  Immediate customer feedback  Fast iteration  Stay competitive
  • 14.
     <Insert ‘HowWe Do It’ / ‘Better’>  Only company that reliably allows you to run 5,000 tests in parallel  Our core engineering team are Selenium and Apium contributors – you are working with the best  We have over 500 browser and mobile combinations for you to test on
  • 15.
     $1M revenueincrease went from 5 days to < 3 minutes
  • 17.
     Gather POCrequirements (proof of concept)  Hands on session with the team – proof is in the pudding!
  • 18.
    Right after thecall: send email to everyone on the call (as well as anyone that missed the call) with the info you promised throughout the demo (i.e. use cases, relevant blog posts), and review next steps / send invite to the next meeting Follow up Follow up Follow up
  • 19.
     Email title:“Response requested: ______ ”  Email: “It seems like now is not the best time for you, so I will go ahead and close your acct”  “Can you please do me a favor”  CC others in the email  TEXT!  911 email – (see next page)
  • 20.
     Hi Zuck, WhileI've tried to reach you, I haven't heard back from you and that tells me one of three things: 1. You've already chosen another ______ for this and if that's the case please let me know so can I stop bothering you. 2. You're still interested but haven't had the time to get back to me yet. 3. You've fallen and can't get up and in that case please let me know and I'll call 911 for you... Please let me know which one it is because I'm starting to worry... Thanks in advance and I look forward to hearing back from you. Regards,
  • 21.
     Set agenda Get everyone in the meeting  Do research on their business initiatives, tech stack  Face to face is always best  Tell a story: 63% of people will remember a story, 5% will remember stats “Macy’s made $1M more per month when they added one more browser to their tests”  Ask for their business: what would it take?  You have control  Show enthusiasm, no matter what: enthusiasm got me apartments in SF!  Always review and schedule next steps. Email title: “Next steps____”  Discount: always an odd #
  • 22.
     Increase #of blog posts: companies with 400 or more pages have 6x more leads than companies with 50-100 pages. How? Simple: keep track of all questions people ask you, then write a blog post answer for each of them. Most people start their searches online anyway.  Let customers buy what they need, don’t try to sell a huge enterprise package with 10 different features when they only want 2 features, it’s like you going to Nordstrom wanting to buy a nice pair of shoes, and them telling you that you have to buy the entire outfit that you don’t even think looks good!
  • 23.