Founder-led sales | Pete Kazanjy (Founding Sales, Atrium)
Pete Kazanji, author of "Founding Sales" and CEO of Atrium, discusses why founders should lead sales, when and how to hire the first salesperson, and tactical tips for improving sales skills.
Deep Dive Analysis
18 Topic Outline
Pete Kazanjy's Background and Journey into Sales
Distinguishing Modern Sales from Old-School Sales Approaches
The Critical Role and Importance of Founder-Led Sales
Indicators for When to Hire Your First Salesperson
Understanding and Iterating on Your Sales Motion
Leading Indicators of Sales Success Beyond Closed Deals
Why Founders Must Engage in Sales (Even PLG Companies)
Essential Mindset Shifts for Improving Sales Performance
Strategies for Rapid Rapport Building and Effective Questioning
Modern Sales: Focusing on Helping Customers Solve Problems
Practical Tips for Enhancing Sales Skills and Targeting
Defining Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) and Personas
Hiring Your First Salespeople: Who to Look For
Early Warning Signs of a Sales Hire Not Working Out
Impact of Remote Work on Junior Salespeople's Development
Overcoming the Fear of Sales and Its Broader Benefits
Recommended Books for Systems Thinking and Leadership
Effective Hiring Strategy: Using Job Simulation Screens
6 Key Concepts
Modern Sales
Modern sales is a more thoughtful, operational, rigorous, and analytical approach to selling. It shifts away from the 'sleazy' stereotype, focusing instead on bringing supply to demand by identifying customer problems and elucidating how a solution can create value, similar to a 'Moneyball' approach in sports.
Founder-Led Sales
This is the initial phase where the founder acts as the primary salesperson, learning to reliably sell the product to early customers. It's crucial for product development, refining the sales message, and building a repeatable sales motion before hiring dedicated sales staff.
Sales Motion
A sales motion encompasses all the activities and steps involved in taking a prospect through the sales process to an eventual close. It should be treated like software, constantly updated and iterated based on customer interactions, objections, and feedback to improve effectiveness.
Leading Indicators
These are early metrics that predict future sales success, such as the number of first meetings, second meetings, or progression to later stages in the sales funnel. Focusing on leading indicators helps identify problems and apply corrections much faster than waiting for lagging indicators like closed deals.
Ideal Customer Profile (ICP)
ICP defines the characteristics of the ideal company or account that would benefit most from your product and is most likely to buy. It helps target sales efforts effectively, ensuring salespeople focus on prospects with a high proclivity for the solution.
Personas
Personas are the specific human roles within an ICP account that salespeople will interact with during the sales process. Understanding these different individuals (e.g., user, technical stakeholder, budget owner) helps tailor communication and navigate complex organizational buying decisions.
8 Questions Answered
Modern sales is a more analytical, operational, and rigorous approach focused on understanding and solving customer problems, rather than just pushing a product. It emphasizes data-driven improvements and a consultative mindset.
Founder-led sales is essential because it directly informs product development, helps the founder discover effective positioning and messaging, and allows them to package a repeatable sales motion before hiring a dedicated sales team. Outsourcing this too early leads to a loss of critical feedback and learning.
Founders should hire their first salesperson when they can reliably and repeatedly close deals themselves at a decent win rate (e.g., 15-25% of first meetings converting to customers) over a statistically significant number of attempts (50-100 at-bats), indicating a repeatable 'selling while loop'.
One way is to practice 'turbo rapport' by quickly building connections with strangers in everyday interactions. Another is to get very clear on your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) and personas to ensure you're targeting people who genuinely have the problem your product solves.
Yes, almost all B2B companies, including PLG ones, eventually build a sales team. While PLG is great for landing and permeating an organization, sales becomes necessary to secure larger enterprise contracts and engage with budget holders who require human interaction for significant investments.
Instead of a VP of Sales, founders should look for early-stage 'pioneer sellers' or 'deputies' from successful sales organizations. These individuals are typically grittier, closer to the actual selling process, and more willing to work with evolving collateral and processes.
Early signs include poor win rates, low activity levels (not getting first or second meetings), or an inability to progress opportunities through the funnel, especially after being provided with the founder's documented sales motion and collateral.
Remote work slows down the learning and correction loops for junior salespeople. In an office setting, they can sit side-by-side, listen to calls, and receive immediate feedback and coaching, accelerating their development and ensuring the sales motion is implemented effectively.
14 Actionable Insights
1. Validate Sales Process
Before hiring your first salesperson, ensure you can reliably convert 15-25% of first meetings into customers, across 50-100 attempts, to prove the sales motion is repeatable.
2. Continuously Update Sales Motion
Treat your sales motion like software, constantly updating it based on customer interactions. Create new slides or talk tracks to address objections and improve effectiveness.
3. Track Leading Sales Indicators
Don’t solely rely on lagging indicators like closed deals; instead, track leading indicators such as conversion rates between sales stages to identify areas for improvement.
4. Adopt a Consultant Sales Mindset
Approach sales as a consultant, identifying prospects whose problems your technology solves. Guide them through discovery questions to reveal inefficiencies and present your solution.
5. Define Ideal Customer Profile
Get very clear on your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), understanding both the characteristics of the target company and the personas within it, to avoid wasting time on unsuitable prospects.
6. Hire Pioneer Salespeople First
After proving your sales motion, hire a couple of early-stage, “pioneer” sellers (deputies or gritty individual contributors) rather than a VP of Sales, as they are better suited to operationalize your knowledge.
7. Document Sales Motion Resources
Ensure new salespeople have all necessary materials, such as slide decks, discovery questions, and demo scripts, to effectively learn and execute the sales motion you’ve developed.
8. Continuously Monitor Sales Performance
Continuously monitor new sales reps’ leading indicators (e.g., number of first meetings, second meeting conversion rates) throughout their ramp-up period to identify issues and provide timely coaching.
9. Avoid Remote for Junior Sales
Work-from-home is problematic for junior salespeople because it slows down critical learning and coaching loops, making it harder to quickly improve their sales motion compared to in-person side-by-side training.
10. Embrace Sales Behaviors
Don’t be afraid of sales; it’s not magical or an innate talent. Getting good at sales behaviors will benefit you in many ways, even if you’re not a born seller.
11. Develop Quick Rapport Skills
Practice building rapid rapport with people in everyday interactions, like bartenders or baristas, to develop the skill of quickly establishing trust and connection with prospects.
12. Master Uncomfortable Questions
Practice asking good, follow-up, and even uncomfortable questions, including asking for money and then waiting for an answer, as these behaviors improve with repetition.
13. Persist Through Multiple Attempts
Recognize that most deals won’t close on the first attempt; persist through multiple interactions and pipeline cycles with prospects, as they may convert on subsequent tries.
14. Implement Written Job Screens
Use a written job screen (e.g., a Google Doc with biographical questions) for sales candidates to filter out unserious applicants, assess communication skills, and check attention to detail.
5 Key Quotes
The thing that I just like to encourage founders and product managers or what have you is just don't be afraid of sales. There's a lot of people out there who would love to tell you a story that it's, you know, it's magical or like, oh, you got to be a born seller or things like that. And it's really not.
Pete Kazanjy
Never mistake your lead gen for your business.
Pete Kazanjy
If you're selling ice to an Eskimo, you're an asshole. Like what is wrong with you? They don't need ice.
Pete Kazanjy
Startups versus incumbents is a race between like, can innovation get to distribution before distribution can get to innovation?
Pete Kazanjy
The way that B2B organizations scale primarily is by adding more salespeople who then have customer facing meetings with prospects.
Pete Kazanjy
2 Protocols
Sales Motion Iteration Process
Pete Kazanjy- Engage with prospects and observe their questions and objections.
- Identify areas where the current message or collateral is insufficient (e.g., a question without a good answer or slide).
- Update the sales motion's 'source code' by creating new slides, refining talk tracks, or adjusting discovery questions.
- Implement the updated sales motion in subsequent interactions.
- Continuously repeat this process dozens of times to refine and improve the sales motion.
Job Simulation Written Screen for Hiring
Pete Kazanjy- Create a Google Doc with about a dozen biographical questions (e.g., 'Tell me about something you've built that you're proud of').
- Provide candidates with edit rights to the Google Doc.
- Instruct candidates to complete the questions and notify when done.
- Filter out candidates who do not complete the screen, demonstrate low effort, or exhibit poor communication/attention to detail.
- Evaluate remaining candidates based on compelling communication and thoroughness.