In today’s SaaS purchasing climate, you are more likely than ever to be dealing with a buying committee. And those committees are getting larger. What does that mean to a seller? And how does the size of the buying committee make selling against the status quo even more difficult? In this episode of Closing Time, Doug Landis of Emergence Capital chats with Insightly’s Dave Osborne about tactics for selling to buying committees, the pitfalls to avoid, and the extra work it takes to close a deal. ...
Mar 11, 2024•18 min•Season 1Ep. 93
Sales kick-off season is upon us. Whether yours is virtual or live and in-person, get ready to be inspired. Geoff Hendricks of Challenger joins Closing Time this week to share what he is hearing in the industry as the major SKO themes for 2024 – and the 2023 hangovers we’re still dealing with. You'll learn how to future-proof your sales approach beyond SKO by establishing a culture of sales training in your org and see the unique way Geoff gets sales leaders to divulge their secrets on his podca...
Mar 04, 2024•16 min•Season 1Ep. 92
Imagine a world where you craft each piece of content, every email, and all sales pitches with one specific individual in mind. Sounds time-consuming and unreasonable, right? But it's actually the approach used by businessman Warren Buffet as he writes his annual letter to shareholders. The letter is read by thousands, but written with one person in mind: Warren's sister, Doris. To make messages truly resonate with the intended audience, sales and marketing professionals must find the perfect ba...
Feb 19, 2024•18 min•Season 1Ep. 91
B2B buyers now spend 80% or more of their journey alone before engaging with a salesperson. So, when they do finally engage with sales, they expect minimal friction, a great experience, and easy access to information to help them make a decision. This is why Josh Fedie founded Salesrach.io - to organize the sales process in a way that makes sense to your customers and 3x the likelihood of closing high-value, low-regret deals. Learn how to optimize for the B2B buyer experience and make buyer enab...
Feb 12, 2024•21 min•Season 1Ep. 90
The future of B2B sales is here, and it's powered by AI. As a salesperson, what features and functions of day-to-day AI do you need to be aware of? In this episode of Closing Time, Ross Simmonds of Foundation Marketing talks about the AI-powered features that salespeople can use today. Learn how to incorporate AI into your sales process, avoid the dark side that comes with it, and discover why embracing this tech is key to closing more deals in the future. Watch the episode on YouTube. Want to b...
Feb 05, 2024•18 min•Season 1Ep. 89
You've heard the saying, “No one ever got fired for buying IBM,” but do you know the psychology behind it? B2B sales reps often focus on how their solution is different, better, and has the latest features and functions. Buyers, meanwhile, are often fundamentally averse to anything revolutionary or innovative. Their professional reputation is on the line with every purchase they make - especially the big ones. In many cases, the secret to building confidence in your solution is to de-risk the pu...
Jan 29, 2024•17 min•Season 1Ep. 88
What if AI has really just given us the ability to create mediocrity at scale? That doesn't actually help sellers or marketers write impactful emails that elicit a response, nor does it help foster brand authenticity. What does work is a three-step guide from Ann Handley, digital marketer, author, and content guru. Ann joins Insightly CMO Chip House to talk about the importance of relationships, connections, and branding when leveraging AI tools. AI-driven authenticity is about using tech not to...
Jan 22, 2024•21 min•Season 1Ep. 87
Is your team trapped in the inefficient cycle of 'checkbox marketing?' Quarterly webinar—check. Monthly newsletter—check. Weekly blog post—check. They're working at 110% capacity but only hit 50% of goals. In an era when marketers have higher expectations and tighter budgets, efficient growth in B2B is critical. Brendan Hufford founded Growth Sprints , a B2B marketing agency, to help companies adopt a more focused, momentum-driven strategy highlighting customer needs and creating valuable conten...
Jan 16, 2024•21 min•Season 1Ep. 86
Content marketing in 2024 looks different than it did in recent years. Why? Because the value of content marketing in B2B has been proven, so it’s no longer a question of whether your content budget is funded but how much you will spend and how you'll optimize it. In this episode of Closing Time, B2B Marketing agency owner Ross Simmonds talks about getting more mileage from your existing content. His mantra is, "Don't just create content for the sake of creating... create something once and dist...
Jan 08, 2024•17 min•Season 1Ep. 85
How can you be creative, have fun, and let your personality shine in sales? Would you believe it’s by cold calling more? In this episode of Closing Time, we welcome Daisy Chung from Orum, who is on a quest to make outbound sellers love cold calling. Daisy shares her own experience in learning how to cold call effectively and provides insight into how cold calling has become significantly easier in recent years. Get ready to change your whole perspective on every salesperson’s least favorite task...
Jan 02, 2024•13 min•Season 1Ep. 84
When you hear the word 'influence,' who do you think of? The person on LinkedIn with 100k followers? The SaaS company that hires a thought leader to advocate for their product? People can be 'influencers' without necessarily having real 'influence.' In the context of B2B, brands (and their leaders) who have influence focus on elevating others, rather than themselves. In his book, “Secrets of Influence,” Matt Brown dives into the heart of what influence truly means, highlighting that real influen...
Dec 19, 2023•16 min•Season 1Ep. 83
Talking less and listening more—a proven method to increase win rates among B2B sellers, and a mantra all GTM leaders want their sales and customer success reps to practice. When you arm your reps with powerful questions, it helps them engage and better understand their buyers, ultimately, leading to more opportunities to acquire, keep and grow revenue. In this episode of Closing Time, customer discovery and listening expert Bob London provides three examples of disruptive questions that go beyo...
Dec 12, 2023•17 min•Season 1Ep. 82
The data doesn't lie: If you are not in the consideration set for a buyer before they begin their buying journey, you have less than a 5% chance of closing that deal. It pays to be top of mind, and B2B marketers do that with brand awareness. In this episode of Closing Time, Insightly CMO Chip House speaks with Dale Harrison, a B2B marketing strategist, on why sales leaders should support and encourage their marketing team’s efforts in branding and brand awareness. Not sure how to communicate the...
Dec 05, 2023•21 min•Season 1Ep. 81
When is the right time to review your go-to-market motions for effectiveness? When is a change of motions in order? Many go-to-market leaders get this wrong by waiting until a crisis or downturn and pivoting in a panic. In this episode of Closing Time, Chris Rack, a sales leader and CEO of the demand gen firm MPR, shares his insights from decades of experience in B2B sales and marketing to help viewers audit their marketing strategy and choose the right go-to-market motion(s) for their business....
Nov 28, 2023•21 min•Season 1Ep. 80
Increasing Average Contract Value (ACV) can help your business grow faster while staying efficient. Think of it this way: all deals take time, but a $10K deal doesn’t take ten times more work than a $1K deal. By increasing your ACV, you can grow your revenue without adding more people or technology. As such, ACV is a key metric in the health of a business - particularly in a recurring revenue SaaS business. In this episode of Closing Time, Insightly CMO Chip House is joined by Hannah Ajikawo, CE...
Nov 21, 2023•19 min•Season 1Ep. 79
Your company is on a roll; you’re selling your product and beginning to expand, but you’re struggling to align on what to do next. How do you decide on messaging? In what order should you execute your marketing plan? What is your unique value proposition, and how can you add marketing as a strategic partner to your go-to-market plans? Jennifer Zick, founder and CEO of Authentic, joins Closing Time to help B2B marketing leaders "Overcome Random Acts of Marketing®" and move toward a marketing stra...
Nov 14, 2023•22 min•Season 1Ep. 78
Can you afford to do audience research? The better question may be, can you afford NOT to? Most marketers are doing typical market research right, but when it comes to audience research, they're missing the mark. Audience research is exactly what it sounds like: Discovering who your audience is, what they pay attention to, and what sources influence them (publications, podcasts, YouTube channels, etc.). The better you know your customers and how their purchasing decisions are being influenced, t...
Nov 07, 2023•22 min•Season 1Ep. 77
B2B buyers are making one thing clear: They want to research on their own before engaging with a salesperson. What’s shocking is how far into the funnel they get alone, as much as 83% of the way. We call this the ‘dark funnel’ (also referred to as dark social), and on this Halloween episode of Closing Time, we’re going to break down how marketers can unearth and track what’s going on in the hidden shadows of B2B marketing. Jen Allen-Knuth, a marketing consultant and evangelist partner at Lavenda...
Oct 31, 2023•26 min•Season 1Ep. 76
When done well, a product launch can propel your business forward, engage your prospects, and drive adption. In fact, 79.5% of companies reported launches had a significant impact on revenue. The challenge? Orchestrating a successful product launch can be a painful process for product marketers – they require robust research, careful collaboration, and (ideally) a well-thought-out launch checklist to keep your GTM strategy on track and stakeholders aligned. Karthik Suresh, co-founder/CPTO of Ign...
Oct 24, 2023•13 min•Season 1Ep. 75
The perfect sales call…does it really exist? The team at Gong Labs might be able to answer. They have analyzed one billion sales calls to help sellers like you build trust, keep buyers engaged, and, ultimately, close more deals. On this episode of Closing Time, we welcome Udi Ledergor of Gong, who will provide actionable tips that you can start using tomorrow to make your next sales call better. How to open a call, how to talk about pricing, and is it OK to swear now and then? You learn all this...
Oct 17, 2023•18 min•Season 1Ep. 74
In the age where personalization and understanding sales prospects shows a big improvement in close rates and deal sizes, why is it that most reps still don’t do enough research? In this episode of Closing Time, Chip talks with Justin Fite of J3 Consulting about a new way to conduct sales prospects research, how sales and marketing can align on ideal targets, and how sales reps can use this information to optimize every opportunity. Watch the episode on YouTube. Want to better align your go-to-m...
Oct 10, 2023•19 min•Season 1Ep. 73
LinkedIn Sales Navigator is a powerful tool for salespeople, but like any app, you’ve got to stay up to date. Recently released features have resulted in some changes that can help sellers streamline the process of finding new leads and making more connections. In this episode of Closing Time, we welcome Mandy McEwen, founder of Mod Girl Marketing, to talk us through LinkedIn Sales Navigator tips and new features that will turn the platform into a lead-feeding machine. Everything from leveraging...
Oct 03, 2023•20 min•Season 1Ep. 72
When your solution makes it on the agenda of your prospect’s weekly meeting, you’ve got a good chance of closing that deal. But how can you get your solution or service considered at that level? In this episode of Closing Time, Hannah Ajikawo, CEO of Revenue Funnel, talks through the pre-work you’ll need to do with your prospect and the questions to ask to become a trusted advisor. Learn how to ‘be in the room without being in the room’ with your prospect and their team using Hannah’s tips to pl...
Sep 26, 2023•13 min•Season 1Ep. 71
If you're currently using a one-size-fits-all sales funnel (that ignores buyer intent or pipeline source) and is focused on top-of-funnel metrics like MQLs... it's time to rethink your strategy. The 'old' sales funnel, originally coined as the Demand Waterfall by SiriusDecisions in the early 2000s and then later revamped in 2012, fails to acknowledge that all MQLs and SQLs are not created equally. As a result, it can lead to misallocation of marketing budgets and misalignment within your sales a...
Sep 19, 2023•17 min•Season 1Ep. 70
Demand capture vs. Demand creation – two of the most important areas of focus for today's marketers. Demand creation (aka demand generation) is about driving awareness and interest in a product or service, while demand capture focuses on attracting and converting the roughly 5% of your target market actively looking for a solution. Familiar marketing frameworks – like the Predictable Revenue and Demand Waterfall – that once laid the groundwork for thousands of B2B SaaS company's go-to-market str...
Sep 12, 2023•17 min•Season 1Ep. 69
“What are we getting for our ad spend?” This question is getting even more difficult to answer since the death of marketing attribution as we know it is looming. GDPR and CPAA have killed third-party cookies, and almost all privacy laws are getting even more strict. Will it be a return to the metrics of impressions, views, and engagement? In this episode of Closing Time, Rand Fishkin, CEO of SparkToro, talks about what marketers need to do to prepare their teams and board rooms for a reporting s...
Sep 05, 2023•18 min•Season 1Ep. 68
Sales professionals – are you struggling to build consensus? Today’s B2B sales cycles are complex and include more decision-makers than ever before. According to recent data, 11.2 stakeholders take part in every deal. Unless you can convince the entire group of stakeholders to buy from you, there's no way the deal will close. But how can you receive a resounding “yes!” from all parties involved? In this episode of Closing Time, Jen Allen, CEO of Social Social and head of community growth at Lave...
Aug 31, 2023•15 min•Season 1Ep. 67
“You’ve got to be posting on LinkedIn.” Depending on your target audience, this may or may not be true. In this episode of Closing Time, Insightly CMO Chip House meets with Kyle Coleman, SVP of Marketing at Clari, about how salespeople can start to build your personal brand on LinkedIn. They explore ways to determine content (based on your experience, expertise, or from industry leaders), the importance of writing in sales, and how you can use your posting efforts to help you crystallize your th...
Aug 29, 2023•17 min•Season 1Ep. 66
Video selling is on a steep growth curve, so why isn’t everyone on board? You can equip your salespeople with the hardware and software required and train them, but they still may not be comfortable with the process. In this episode of Closing Time, we welcome Tyler Lessard, VP of Marketing at Vidyard, author of the book The Visual Sale, and host of The Sales Feed podcast, to talk us through ways to get your sales team enthusiastically on board with video selling. Watch the episode on YouTube. W...
Aug 24, 2023•15 min•Season 1Ep. 65
You’ve worked on your personal branding on LinkedIn, and now you’re looking for tangible results. How do you go from reaching out to someone in your ICP to counting them as a customer? In this episode of Closing Time, we welcome Mandy McEwen, founder of Mod Girl Marketing, to talk you through her 4-step engage - connect - post - repeat process for LinkedIn social selling. She’ll share tips for using prospecting skills plus effective content to move relationships to the next level. Watch the epis...
Aug 22, 2023•15 min•Season 1Ep. 64
