Devon Henning of Board Room Confidential joins us to discuss the what, how, and why around compensation from the candidate level. the misalignment of compensation.  Learning how to negotiate salary without fear. Understanding short term thinking vs long term as you. 

What are you waiting for?  Time to reserve your spot at www.surfandsales.com

Appy joins us and discuss building a sales development to IPO.  Understanding the lock-up periods post IPO.  What a multi-channel approach really means in 2024. 

What are you waiting for?  Time to reserve your spot at www.surfandsales.com

Shawn Rhodes of Bulletproof Selling joins us on the Surf and Sales podcast to discuss   The soft side of the metrics that are overlooked. How to manage the fear in the moment. The best ways to get into conversations with the people you want and bypass the gatekeepers.

What are you waiting for?  Time to reserve your spot at www.surfandsales.com

What's wrong with the recruiting pricing model
Retrain your brain on how to leverage the recruiter relationship better
Why do most companies not get the recruiter relationship wrong?
The blindspots of entrepreneurs when it comes to growing
The four questions you should ask about your current team to grow to the next level
Does your employee have the experience and skills to get to the next level? 

Keith Daw has an amazing story. After spending years working for others, he cut the cord and built his own business. He shares his advice on how to:

The mindset founders struggle with.
You pay me to tell me what to do, not what you want to do
Deciding to bet on yourself and cut the W2
Figuring out your pricing and contracts when starting your consulting business.
What about the ROI phrase

Understanding your customer before you speak with them
Your growth in sales will be based more than on your work experience
Working on your confidence in sales
The key to success starts with repairing the damage from growing up

It's always fun chatting with our good friend John Barrows.

This is a recording of the live Bonfire Session we did with him on the topic of ROI is dead, and we answered questions from the crowd as well. 

Seeing the problem vs. taking the leap of faith
The first step to becoming a founder
What the MVP should look like and how not to overbuild
What makes the best first GTM salesperson
Optimizing growth for people who want to learn
Improving the relationship between the AE and Sales Engineer

Selling is a spiritual experience. This was just one of the knowledge bombs dropped by our guest Denis Champagne. Denis is one of these folks who have so much wisdom about life, not just life, and a ton about sales including:

Winning is about the achievement, not beating the opponent
The discipline to be good

It's easier to change plans than not to make them.
You can hide the face but not the voice, especially in prospecting.
Personal wealth is preceded by personal growth
Target,  Execution, Account for Activity, Measure, Manage, Success

Why does a VC have a VP of Sales and Customer Success
Coming from product engineering to a sales leader
Is your sales team Wolf of Wall Street or Moneyball
Is product management the future of sales
What founders do not understand what they need in go-to-market strategy, hires, and companies
What's the difference between a VP of Sales at $1m, $5m-$10m
What has this person done vs what have they been a part of
It's ok to hire the #2 or #3 rep on the sales team

How do you know which sales methodology is the right one for you?
How do you choose the right type of mentor?
What books are you reading?
Painting pictures of pain
How do you run a discovery call?
How do you determine access to authority?

Through her own experiences, Emily recognized where her passion for success caused her to burn out and turned it into her business. She shares a ton of real-world and practical advice so we can all feel a little less stress.

You don't have to meditate to be mindful
Resilience and Prevention 
The primary differences in how people experience
Recognizing the triggers of your burnout
When you define your personal worth based on your success
Recognizing 
Where to start when you are feeling burned out.

BAM!  This episode will leave you craving more of Mesheel Baker! Her wisdom is amazing and she is the master of inspiration. Here's a few nuggets to wet your whistle. Recognizing something that feels impossible and exhilerating at the same time is something to focus on. Chaos is merely an illusion. And your circumstances are external and temorary, your confidence is internal and unlimited.

Elyse took her annual 6-figure income to 7-figures in 6 weeks, literally.  She shares her growth and is over the hump of the fear. 

Getting unstuck from the $150 OTE is more than about the money
Sales are not just about the hustle
Difference between masculine and feminine energy
Feminine is about play, fun, relationships, the journey
Masculine energy, the destination, structure, where you are going
Leaning into your intuition in your sales process
The difference between 6-figure and 7-figure income people

Mark Smith tells it how it is. A VP of Sales multiple times over, he has dabbled in politics, consulting, advising and investing. So why leave everything behind and take a sabbatical? We sit down with Mark to discuss how his definition of success has evolved over the years, and the lessons he hopes to impart upon the next generation of sellers and leaders.

Recognition that shows value more than the promotion itself.
Managing a team of North American SDRs from the UK
Learning how to let go lets you have more control
What could you do to position yourself for the next role as an SDR
Accelerate out of your current role.

The Crow's Nest is a special place in Costa Rica where sincere and intimate conversations happen with attendees. We want to create the same moments away from Costa Rica and this is one of those episodes 

What to do when transitioning your role
Navigating the interview process
Recruiters are the gatekeeper 
Shrinking the delta between idea and action
Why you don't need to SEO Amazon when you write a book.

A special episode with our friends from Salesforce supporting your team around the topic of mental health. 

Amazing insights are shared by Niraj Kapur, Lindsey Boggs, Elyese Archer, Richard Harris and Marcus Chan

2. How do you measure yourself when you aren't held accountable to a number as a solo-preneur

RevOps leaders are focused on providing their teams with support and outreach strategies to boost engagement with prospects and customers. In our digitally-saturated world, it’s more important than ever to include personalized touchpoints into sales workflows.

How do you use your gifting process to keep prospects engaged during a long sales cycle?
What percentage of gifts are branded vs. un-branded?
And this is what people get wrong about the whole gifting idea.?
When gifting goes wrong
Should gifting be used in the recruiting stage
Using a sequence of gifts through the sales cycle

The value of a sales focus being in RevOps
Running rev ops with 20 employees vs 1,000
Understanding the revenue lifecycle
Recognizing enterprise risk
Tool familiarity cannot be the only hiring criteria
The pitfalls of 3rd party full-time contractor
Should RevOps have variable compensation
What does an advisor even do

Rare is the first head of sales making it past 18 months at a startup. Scotland is in rarified air and shares his experiences with us including: 

Go to market workspace
First 18 months as head of sales at 16 months
The priorities of a new head of sales for the first 16 months
Build a capacity plan vs forecasting plan
Don't overly process in the early stages
3 Types of early-stage revenue operators
Recapturing the momentum after a miss
Pricing integrity 

Matt Wolach joins us on the Surf and Sales podcast to discuss why the best products have the worst sales motion. How hating to lose is better than wanting to win.

What are you waiting for?  Time to reserve your spot at www.surfandsales.com

It's never about personalization at scale, its about relevancy at scale and Nadja shares these best practices as well as others

What its like to turn down $30m and stay bootstrapped
Building a community from the ground up
Why LinkedIn is a requirement for all employees
Leading a team through the Ukrainian crisis
Personalization at scale is misaligned
Proper monetization of your community

The challenges of the side hustle people don't talk about. 
The challenges of recruiting in 2022
What a start-up should know about hiring recruiting
There is a shortage of good recruiters
What are the skillsets of a good recruiter
Stop trying to hire the perfect product when you hire people

Sometimes we get so process-oriented, we lose sight of the creativity in sales. Chris Bogue is on a mission to change that. Check out his insights on all of these topics.

• The creator economy
• The Sales Evangelist
• Co-Selling where the reference is coming from matters
• Thought Leader vs. Evangelist
• If most people are saying yes to your prices, you are not charging enough

This episode is like a Marvel movie with a secret scene. 

• When an engineer builds a sales tool
• Recruiting is a sales job, and what makes a good communicator
• How should Heads of Sales work with a CTO
• There is only so much you can do to save an employee
  
• The pressure of results on sales from an outside point of view.
  
• Are sales targets misaligned to customer happiness?
  
• Salespeople get paid for immediate results, engineers get paid for future performance
  
• Compensation reflective of ownership
  
• How to get more stuff done when sales and engineering communicate well.

Listen to 2nd half of this episode first! It's hard being a founder. However, they bring a fresh perspective. Erol brings an amazing point of view about the no commission sales world and a whole lot more

Eliminating manual data entry into CRM
Getting to the quality data from your quantity data
Why your SMB, MM, Enterprise sales experience is not that important 
What it means to hire a sales leader too early or too late
Understanding your customer maturity model
The value of eliminating commissions in your sales model

Archie joins us on the Surf and Sales podcast to discuss the mistakes you will make on your start-up ideation journey. He also gives the best advice on how to find the right thing to focus on as you build your start-up idea or side hustle.

What are you waiting for?  Time to reserve your spot at www.surfandsales.com

This is a different episode. Its the one where the guest comes on and asks for career advice.  Eric is a fractional CRO looking to build his brand and business. He's helped start several sales teams and is trying to figure out "scaling". 

We won't give it away too much in the show notes. Listen in and learn.

What it means to sell to SaaS companies when you don't have a lot of Saas experience
Which comes first on LinkedIn, content on connections
Your brand claims you, you don't claim your brand

We all have our goals in life, and often create plans. Derek explores why you are closer to your 5-year goal than you really think you are along with his journey from pastry chef to sales leader

The best advice for AEs need to hear about prospecting
Why you should hire a person with no sales experience and nowhere else to go for the sales role
From Pastry Chef to Sales
The difference between internal and external fear and how they motivate you
When it makes sense for SDRs to report to marketing
The state of SDR compensation
What does being part of a merger feels like

Kelsey has the ideal path for a revenue leader. SDR to AE, to Customer Success. She shares her knowledge and wisdom with you.

The struggles of writing professionally.
How to build a business using a podcast
The value of sales in customer success
Should everyone in customer success have a sales background
Should CSM roles have variable compensation
Don't get blinded by losing the quota when you move to customer success from sales.

Making commitments and sticking them
Define your time horizon
What to do once you get product-market fit
What do you do in the first 60-90 days
The advantage of focusing on the low hanging fruit
How and when to hire a Sales Ops
What makes a good sales ops hire

Creating better rigor with your sales leaders
What do people get wrong about coaching sales coaches
The skillset you're you should be coaching your managers.
Are you HSP - Highly Sensitive Personality
The difference in selling over a chat. 
How to transfer the conversation from a chat.
Best advice for new sales leaders.

Going from product/market fit to scale
What steps do founders skip when scaling
When should a founder stop selling and give to the sales team
Founders do not know how to transition from founder-led sales to a sales team
The grunt work most founders avoid in sales
When should a founder bring in ahead of sales
What good inbound really means
Can this product effect your share price

Lexy Franklin of Sidebar joins us on the Surf and Sales podcast to discuss the next evolution of communities. He goes deep on helping people realize that the problems you solve in life and business of your career are interdisciplinary and cross-functional. 

What are you waiting for?  Time to reserve your spot at www.surfandsales.com

Evolve or die. That is the lesson in this episode. There is no need to be an influencer, be a sales evangelist. Join us as Will Aitken jumps in and shares his journey from salesperson to sales evangelist. We dive into: 

The new role in sales is a sales evangelist
Using TikTok to leverage
The transition from full-time sales to an evangelist
"You don't have to wait for the promotion"

An amazing conversation to start of Season 3 with Lori Dunn. So good we let her take over to ask us more questions. 

Overcoming the "We are ok right now"
Messaging the old tech to sell new tech
The hardest part of building from scratch in sales
Pricing in the early stages
The right questions to ask your CEO at a start-up
Shifting from Founder-led sales
Identifying the metrics in the early stage

The demo environment and demo experience are broken. And so is the interview and job hiring process. Adam Jay shares amazing insights on both of these and other topics including:

What makes a bad a demo?
Why you should only offer a POC
Why you shouldn't pay for a POC
Recruiting requirements for VP of Sales
What are the questions candidates should ask a VP of Sales
The value of "Tell me more"