2020 has been full of challenges – especially when it comes to leading a sales prospecting team.
We got fifteen SDR leaders in the B2B SaaS industry to tell the stories behind their recent pivots. In each article in this Strategic Prospecting Tips series, you’ll find real, unfiltered advice from one Sales Development Leader that’s influencing the B2B SaaS industry worldwide.
Today we’re hearing from Bryan Elsesser, Senior Director of Sales Development at Aircall. Let’s jump on in!
I have led successful, high-velocity sales and sales development teams in New York City across a multitude of digital technology, SaaS, AdTech, and MarTech firms.
Our company, like most companies, has been pushed into a remote work environment due to COVID-19. But there has never been a greater sense of collaboration and focus in each of our teams at Aircall. We have been rising to the occasion to help our customers meet the challenges of going remote, while also meeting the expectations of our employees to thrive in an unpredictable environment.
The most significant change in our sales development division has been in our strategy. COVID has forced us to think differently about our ICP and to become more targeted and focused on who and how we are engaging prospects.
Instead of heading towards our traditional market segments, we’ve focused on parts of the market that have grown in this environment. We’ve identified companies that may have an increased need for our product and changed our content to be more customer-focused and customer-centric than ever.
Our revolutionary pivot at Aircall has been to continue to embrace a customer-centric ABM model in our strategy. We increased our targeting and decreased our guessing. The key to a post-COVID world in sales is to embrace the customer and their experience with every interaction they have with the company from the first touch-point in sales, all the way through to ongoing support post-sale. And as an SDR leader, you need to be just as focused on post-sale as pre-sale.
More than ever, we see that our customers have expectations. They expect us to approach the market with understanding and empathy, but they also expect a customer experience that enables them to thrive. It’s no longer just about the customer. It’s about how our product will help our customers help theirs. Our mission has to be to enable their mission.
At Aircall, we know that, more than ever, we need to embrace the goals of our customers and see the world through their eyes. Through their eyes, we can truly see our ability to make a positive impact, especially in an uncertain time.
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