Dreamdata’s Post

Last week I had the opportunity to join the Gong Customer Advisory Forum in London. Thank you to Kathy O'Donnell, Lesley Ronaldson, Craig Hanson, and team for being incredible hosts and running an insightful 💡 and thought-provoking day of discussions. In addition to growing my love of Gong 😍 and being even more excited about the direction the team are taking the product 🤩 the conversations shed light on prevalent challenges faced by scale-up and SMB organizations: - XFN alignment: With the rapid pace of innovation, aligning cross-functional teams poses a growing challenge as processes quickly become outdated. - Pipeline Generation: In a saturated market, organisations struggle to stand out despite robust GTM strategies and value propositions. - Toggle Fatigue: AEs juggle an average of 10 tools per deal, emphasizing the importance of process efficiency and tool adoption in sales. Interesting data shared also included: - 77% of sales time spent on non-selling activities, impacting productivity. - 72% of organizations consistently miss forecasts, highlighting predictability challenges. - SaaS sales averaging a 34% attainment to quota, signalling growth challenges. We're always seeing wins and advice shared on LinkedIn. I'm sharing these to illuminate some of the shared challenges that no organisation will be immune to. Amidst these, it's crucial to adapt and foster an environment that empowers individuals to thrive, innovate, and drive solutions. I'm grateful to work in a team where, alongside the wins, successes and highlights, we create an environment to proactively search for the gaps, celebrate the learns, and embrace change and failure along the way. Grateful to work with the best team 🤗 Catarina Barandela Heleen Lodewykx Aneta Janiec Matthew DeRosa Jesse Dahms Enjoy the journey! 💚 #Challenges #Innovation #SalesInsights

There's a tendency to focus on lost opportunities in win/loss analysis. Here are 10 reasons to focus on your wins instead: 1. Refine your ICP 2. Dial-in your messaging 3. Validate product feautres 4. Identify sales tactics that resonated 5. Identify your competitive advantage 6. Enhance your competitive positioning 7. Identify up-sell/cross-sell opportunities 8. Higher response rates from closed wins 9. Optimise campaigns towards what worked 10. Quickly pinpoint and amplify what's already working well 11. Customers are more likely to be truthful in sharing their feedback (I think there's value in analysing both wins AND losses. Don't neglect either). P.S. What other benefits have you seen from analysing wins? Inspiration for this post from April Dunford

Earlier this year, we hosted a roundtable discussion with a group of leading CMOs where we debated about various topics such as how to drive engagement. Read more about what was discussed during the event here: https://lnkd.in/dYqu4s3P #Roundtable #MarketingStrategy #B2BMarketing

Make sure to check out this webinar with Greg Campbell & 🌎 Victoria Frederika Albert Today's discussion is around unlocking predictable revenue by establishing meaningful connections with buying groups within your target accounts. Learn how to address unique needs using accurate account and buyer intelligence tools. Delve into insights from exclusive research conducted by INFUSE, covering business and tech purchase drivers, buying committee roles, company priorities, and decision-making tools. Don't miss out on developing GTM strategies that resonate with multiple buyers!

I gained some interesting insights from my former colleague Vanessa Cheal and a recent #CMO study by Transmission. While I was already aware of the challenges #marketers and #salespeople face in breaking down #silos, I was surprised to learn about the specific challenges CMOs encounter in the #boardroom. It seems to be an "interesting" situation for many. The good news is that there are lots of opportunities for improvement. B2B Media Group supports with its excellent data in showing #ROI. #b2bMarketing

⭐ Client testimonial ⭐ A big thanks to Stewart at Powered by Coffee for this testimonial and valuable feedback. We enjoyed working with PBC at the end of 2023 and the beginning of 2024. So, what did we achieve? Through two phases, we helped: Phase ☝️ - Reshape company-wide positioning - Develop clear and value-driven USPs - Gain a deeper understanding of their customer, markets and competitors - Create client case studies 🚀 The Result: Created a position and proposition that spoke directly to their ideal clients Phase ✌️ - Fine-tune their sales process - Sharpen their proposals - Streamline commercial process to increase deal negotiations and win rates - Implement outreach campaigns to build relationships with their dream clients 🚀 The Result: Revenue increase of £26k within two months

Where are you focussing your ABM efforts this year? In the first few weeks of 2024 we've seen a notable shift in priorities from our new business enquiries. Yes, scale and commercial impact are still objectives. However last year, the focus was net new logo acquisition. Understandable perhaps in tough market conditions but considering the complexity and length of most of these sales cycles the biggest impact in year 1 will be pipeline rather than significant in-year revenue. Of the 3 prospective clients we've spoken to in the last week, all 3 are prioritising either pipeline acceleration or customer growth in their account selections. This is where an ABM motion can have the biggest in-year impact by: - Shortening sales cycles and time to revenue - Increasing deal value (or avoiding price erosion) - Developing strategic relationships for long-term value Drop a DM to Orla Murphy or Luke Porter if you'd like to know more about how we approach this!

My teams know by now that every quarter I'm on a quest to take something to the next level. Last quarter was getting our #SDR motions streamlined, automated, and focused on engagement. We've made a ton of program. This quarter, yep it's Q4 already 😏 , I'm focused on getting our sellers in lock step, at each phase of the funnel, with our demand generation and outbound strategies. I know Stefan Burak and Cory Smits want to run when they see me coming but they agree. The alignment across our teams is a make or break with discerning, highly digital buyers. We've made some major leaps forward leveraging Qualified and the Folloze integration with Outreach but we can do so much more. It's all in the orchestration and response we help develop for our AEs and AMs. What does this mean? It means thinking through the stages of the buyer journey at a much more granular level. Fine-tuning the triggers in your systems to not only know when it's time to take action but to create the resources for sellers to take action in that moment. Things like Outreach triggers tied to engagement scores in Folloze that let a seller know it's time to send engagement communication #3 to the prospect or other members of the buying them. I envision a world where sellers save their highly valued brain cells and relationship skills for live interactions highly engaged, ready-to-buy customers. Not spinning their wheels running after lukewarm opportunities because there's nothing else to do. By the end of Q4, in my world, their days will be mapped out for them. They'll know what to do based on engagement and have everything at their fingertips to do it well, on brand, and in a way that is meaningful to their buyer. So, for those of you starting your sales / marketing alignment journey by getting your goals together, congratulations. You're just getting started. We've put together a few practical ideas to help you #marketers take the lead.

How can a story-driven approach help achieve the sales transformation outcomes you need? Revenue growth, market penetration, stronger client relationships, higher conversion ratios? We’ve demonstrated over 20 years how a compelling, relatable, and emotionally engaging story can rapidly activate people – creating belief in the sales strategy, building the capability to bring the story to life for colleagues and customers and embedding lasting behaviour change. As illustrated in the final chapter of our Reimagining Sales story - it gives you the edge, like the rocket fuel you need to: Lift off: Put yourself in your client's shoes, generate deep sales and exceed targets.   As one global CEO put it, after seeing the acceleration of his organisation’s strategy through story-driven activation, “Why isn’t everybody doing this?”.   Get in touch with our senior team, who can share the outcomes achieved with clients across telecoms, manufacturing, finance and FMCG. Alison Esse Hannah Moyo Robert Tennant Stanley Louw Blane Sweeney