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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Fachliteratur
- Sprache: Englisch
Break your revenue records with Silicon Valley's "growth bible" "This book makes very clear how to get to hyper-growth and the work needed to actually get there" Why are you struggling to grow your business when everyone else seems to be crushing their goals? If you needed to triple revenue within the next three years, would you know exactly how to do it? Doubling the size of your business, tripling it, even growing ten times larger isn't about magic. It's not about privileges, luck, or working harder. There's a template that the world's fastest growing companies follow to achieve and sustain much, much faster growth. From Impossible to Inevitable details the hypergrowth playbook of companies like Hubspot, Salesforce.com (the fastest growing multibillion dollar software company), and EchoSign--aka Adobe Document Services (which catapulted from $0 to $144 million in seven years). Whether you have a $1 billion or a $100,000 business, you can use the same insights as these notable companies to learn what it really takes to break your own revenue records. * Pinpoint why you aren't growing faster * Understand what it takes to get to hypergrowth * Nail a niche (the #1 missing growth ingredient) * What every revenue leader needs to know about building a scalable sales team There's no time like the present to surpass plateaus and get off of the up-and-down revenue rollercoaster. Find out how now!
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Seitenzahl: 489
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019
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Table of Contents
Cover
Preface: Systematizing Success
LESSONS FROM THE WORLD'S FASTEST-GROWING COMPANIES
PART I: Nail a Niche
CHAPTER 1: “Niche” Doesn't Mean Small
ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE READY TO GROW FASTER?
HOW TO KNOW IF YOU'VE NAILED A NICHE
ACHIEVE WORLD DOMINATION ONE NICHE AT A TIME
THE ARC OF ATTENTION
CHAPTER 2: Signs of Slogging
ARE YOU A NICE-TO-HAVE?
BIG COMPANIES SUFFER, TOO
CASE STUDY: WHERE AARON WENT WRONG
YOUR CURRENT STRENGTH CAN BE A FUTURE WEAKNESS
CHAPTER 3: How to Nail It
WHERE CAN YOU BE A BIG FISH IN A SMALL POND?
WORK THROUGH THE NICHE MATRIX
CASE STUDY: HOW TWILIO NAILED A BILLION-DOLLAR NICHE BY WALKING IN ITS CUSTOMERS’ SHOES
THE 20-INTERVIEW RULE
CHAPTER 4: Your Pitch
IF YOU WERE A RADIO STATION, WOULD ANYONE TUNE IN?
ELEVATOR PITCHES ARE ALWAYS FRUSTRATING
THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT “YOU”: THREE SIMPLE QUESTIONS
PART II: Create Predictable Pipeline
INTRODUCTION: LEAD GENERATION ABSOLVES MANY SINS
CHAPTER 5: Seeds—Customer Success
HOW TO GROW SEEDS PREDICTABLY
CASE STUDY: HOW GILD DROPPED MONTHLY CHURN FROM 4 TO 1
CASE STUDY: CUSTOMER SERVICE EXCELLENCE AT TOPCON
CHAPTER 6: Nets—Marketing
THREE UNCOMMON APPROACHES OF HYPERGROWTH CMOs
THE FORCING FUNCTION YOUR MARKETING LEADER NEEDS: A “SALES QUALIFIED LEAD COMMIT”
CORPORATE MARKETING VERSUS DEMAND GENERATION
HOW INBOUND CHANGED IN 10 YEARS BETWEEN SCALING MARKETO TO $100M+ AND FOUNDING ENGAGIO
HEROIC MARKETING: WHEN YOU HAVE NO MONEY AND LITTLE TIME
NOTE
CHAPTER 7: Spears—Outbound Prospecting
WHERE OUTBOUND WORKS BEST—AND WHERE IT FAILS
OUTBOUND LESSONS LEARNED SINCE
PREDICTABLE REVENUE
WAS PUBLISHED
CASE STUDY: OUTBOUND'S ROLE IN ACQUIA'S $100 MILLION TRAJECTORY
CASE STUDY: HOW SAGEMOUNT TRIPLES THE VALUE OF A COMPANY IN THREE YEARS
CASE STUDY: HOW ZUORA DRIVES 60%-PLUS OF ITS GROWTH BY OUTBOUND, EVEN WHEN ACCOUNTS NEED NURTURING FOR YEARS
BUILD AN OUTBOUND PROGRAM RIGHT THE FIRST TIME
HAVE YOU BEEN TOO SUCCESSFUL AT INBOUND?
CHAPTER 8: What Executives Miss
PIPELINE CREATION RATE: YOUR #1 LEADING METRIC
THE 15/85 RULE: EARLY ADOPTERS AND MAINSTREAM BUYERS
WHY YOU'RE UNDERESTIMATING CUSTOMER LIFETIME VALUE
PART III: Make Sales Scalable
CHAPTER 9: Learn from Our Mistakes
GROWTH CREATES MORE PROBLEMS THAN IT SOLVES—BUT THEY ARE BETTER PROBLEMS
TOP 12 MISTAKES IN BUILDING SALES TEAMS
ADVICE FROM THE VP SALES BEHIND LinkedIn AND EchoSign
CHAPTER 10: Specialization: Your #1 Sales Multiplier
WHY SALESPEOPLE SHOULDN'T PROSPECT
CASE STUDY: HOW CLIO RESTRUCTURED SALES IN THREE MONTHS
CAN YOU BE TOO SMALL, OR TOO BIG, TO SPECIALIZE?
SPECIALIZATION: TWO COMMON OBJECTIONS
SPECIALIZATION SNAPSHOT AT ACQUIA
CHAPTER 11: Sales Leaders
THE #1 MIS-HIRE IS THE VP/HEAD OF SALES
THE RIGHT VP SALES FOR YOUR STAGE
TEN FAVORITE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
CHAPTER 12: Hiring Best Practices for Sales
IF YOU'RE A STARTUP: FOUR PHASES OF HIRING YOUR FIRST SALES TEAM
SIMPLE HIRING TRICKS
WHEN DOING SOMETHING NEW, START WITH TWO
THE $100 MILLION HubSpot SALES MACHINE: RECRUITING AND COACHING ESSENTIALS
CASE STUDY: HOW TO CUT DOWN ON WASTED INTERVIEWING
CHAPTER 13: Scaling the Sales Team
IF YOU'RE CHURNING MORE THAN 10% OF YOUR SALESPEOPLE, THEY AREN'T THE PROBLEM
THREE WAYS TO CUT CHURN AND INCREASE SALES MOTIVATION WHILE YOU SCALE
ADVICE TO CEOS: PUT NONSALES LEADERS ON VARIABLE COMP PLANS, TOO
ARE YOUR ENTERPRISE DEALS TAKING FOREVER?
FIVE KEY SALES METRICS (WITH A TWIST)
CHAPTER 14: For Startups Only
EVERY TECH COMPANY SHOULD OFFER SERVICES
WHAT JASON INVESTS IN, AND DO YOU NEED TO RAISE MONEY TO SCALE?
WHAT THE HEADCOUNT OF A 100-PERSON SaaS COMPANY LOOKS LIKE
PART IV: Double Your Deal Size
CHAPTER 15: Deal Size Math
YOU NEED 50 MILLION USERS TO MAKE FREEMIUM WORK
SMALL DEALS GET YOU STARTED, BIG DEALS DRIVE GROWTH
CHAPTER 16: Not Too Big, Not Too Small
WHEN YOU CAN'T TURN SMALL DEALS INTO BIG ONES
IF YOU HAVE CUSTOMERS OF ALL SIZES
CHAPTER 17: Going Upmarket
IF YOU DON'T WANT SALESPEOPLE …
ADD ANOTHER TOP PRICING TIER
PRICING IS ALWAYS A PAIN
GOING FORTUNE 1000
PART V: Do the Time
CHAPTER 18: Embrace Frustration
ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE READY FOR THIS?
EVERYONE HAS A YEAR OF HELL
COMFORT IS THE ENEMY OF GROWTH
MOTIVATION: HOW AARON REACHED ESCAPE VELOCITY
CHAPTER 19: Success Isn't a Straight Line
THE ANXIETY ECONOMY AND ENTREPRENEUR DEPRESSION
MARK SUSTER'S QUESTION: “SHOULD A PERSON LEARN OR EARN?”
WHEN A STRAIGHT LINE ISN'T THE SHORTEST PATH TO SUCCESS
CHANGE
YOUR
WORLD, NOT
THE
WORLD
PART VI: Embrace Employee Ownership
CHAPTER 20: A Reality Check
DEAR EXECUTIVES (FROM AN EMPLOYEE)
DEAR EMPLOYEE (FROM THE EXECUTIVES)
P.S.: “DEAR SENIOR EXECUTIVES, DON’T GET LEFT BEHIND” (FROM THE CEO AND BOARD)
ARE YOUR PEOPLE RENTING OR OWNING?
CHAPTER 21: For Executives: Create Functional Ownership
A SIMPLE SURVEY
“NO SURPRISES”
FUNCTIONAL OWNERSHIP
CASE STUDY: HOW A STRUGGLING TEAM TURNED INTO A SELF-MANAGING SUCCESS
TO TURN THINGS AROUND
CHAPTER 22: Taking Ownership to the Next Level
FINANCIAL OWNERSHIP
MOVE PEOPLE AROUND
THE FOUR TYPES OF EMPLOYEES
PART VII: Define Your Destiny
CHAPTER 23: Are You Abdicating Your Opportunity?
YOUR OPPORTUNITY IS BIGGER THAN YOU REALIZE
HOW TO EXPAND YOUR OPPORTUNITY AT WORK
YOU NEED SOME HUMDRUM PASSIONS
YOUR COMPANY ISN'T YOUR MOMMY OR DADDY
FORCING FUNCTIONS: HOW TO MOTIVATE YOURSELF TO DO THINGS YOU DON'T FEEL LIKE DOING
SALES IS A LIFE SKILL
SALES IS A MULTISTEP PROCESS
CHAPTER 24: Combining Money and Meaning
MEANING GONE WRONG
WHAT'S YOUR UNIQUE GENIUS?
IGNORING REAL LIFE DOESN'T MAKE IT GO AWAY
AARON, HOW THE HELL DO YOU JUGGLE 10 KIDS AND WORK?
A Thank You …
About the Authors
Index
End User License Agreement
List of Illustrations
Chapter 1
FIGURE 1.1 Arc of Attention
Chapter 2
FIGURE 2.1 Where is your sweet spot of target, pain, and solution?
FIGURE 2.2 Nailing a Niche is the first step of turning struggle into success.
Chapter 5
FIGURE 5.1 Customer Success is a beautiful way to fertilize growth.
FIGURE 5.2 Turn your revenue funnel into an hourglass by tracking how Customer ...
Chapter 6
FIGURE 6.1 What content is loved by your market
and
creates measurable results?
FIGURE 6.2 When everyone works together, you achieve revenue success.
FIGURE 6.3 Comparison of marketing and sales funnels.
FIGURE 6.4 The four account-based marketing styles.
Chapter 7
FIGURE 7.1 Careful targeting is the key to outbound success.
FIGURE 7.2 Enemy #1: Human Error.
FIGURE 7.3 Common challenges in systematizing outbound prospecting.
FIGURE 7.4 Enterprise value created by growth factors.
FIGURE 7.5 A call scorecard.
FIGURE 7.6 The three phases buyers go through.
Chapter 10
FIGURE 10.1 Specialize people so they can do fewer things, better.
FIGURE 10.2 The Four Core sales roles.
Chapter 11
FIGURE 11.1 The type of VP Sales skills you need changes by stage.
Chapter 16
FIGURE 16.1 How much of your revenue comes from which different customer segmen...
Chapter 17
FIGURE 17.1 Going upmarket can increase both Customer Success and revenue.
Chapter 18
FIGURE 18.1 The Year of Hell is part of the journey.
Chapter 21
FIGURE 21.1 Push decisions down to avoid executive bottlenecks and develop your...
Chapter 22
FIGURE 22.1 The four types of employees (excluding the Toxic/Liar type)
Chapter 23
FIGURE 23.1 Don't let yourself chicken out … go through with it in any way you ...
Chapter 24
FIGURE 24.1 You have a unique genius, even if you don't appreciate or understan...
FIGURE 24.2 List out all your interests (you don't need to make it pretty).
Guide
Cover
Table of Contents
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Praise for From Impossible to Inevitable
What readers have said about From Impossible to Inevitable …
“Best book I've ever read.”
—Andrew Gazdecki, CEO, Bizness Apps
“Simply the best book on successfully creating a startup ever written. As the CEO of a growing SaaS business, I can tell you from personal experience that this is the growth bible.”
—SP Norwell
“This is a great business book for both small and large organizations.”
—Robin McKay
“Over the past eight years, I decided to become really good at sales and lead generation. I've read and studied everything I could, practicing several different methods of generating traffic and sales. This book made me feel like a dummy. Wow, it's amazing – really brilliant. Aaron and Jason outline simple solutions with specific methodologies that make it seem impossible to fail. They tell you why, how, and what can go wrong. Their use of case studies clearly illustrates common growth challenges and how to navigate past or through them. It's changed my whole method of working.”
—Fraser Morrison, CEO, Schiffman Morrison Asia
“At our portfolio company, Agility Recovery, Aaron and Jason's ‘10× Exercise’ helped us increase our enterprise deal sizes 4.8× in under six months by enhancing our offering, modifying our sales approach, and implementing value-based pricing.”
—Larry Coble, LLR Partners
“I was amazed by this book. Aaron and Jason are unbelievable references for anyone working in the SaaS space. They're not just ‘been there, done that’ professionals, they're thoughtful leaders in the community. Their sales model math completely changed our business and pricing strategies. For example, it seems obvious in hindsight, but their ‘Double Your Deal Size’ section nailed it for us: We weren't able to build a big business out of small deals. This book is a must-read for any B2B entrepreneur.”
—Leo Faria, hustler and founder
“Most business books tend to be dry and dull. Aaron and Jason's informal approach is a refreshing change and much more interesting and better: useful. Details and case studies (like the one outlining HTML versus personal, plain-text email campaigns) made it easy for me to put the ideas to work right away. I can see anyone who wants to succeed getting remarkable insights here, as I did.”
—Sabrina Bianchi, marketing and social media strategist
“I came to this book wanting to see how these people grew 10×, and I did, but what was truly amazing was how much of that could be applied and adapted by even the smallest businesses, like my own. No 30,000-foot view here; this book is straightforward, very hands-on, very in the trenches, and, because of that, very exciting.”
—Larry Hicock, CEO, Sparketers
“The topics within From Impossible to Inevitable have brought my own career to new and exciting levels. The book has fed the beast of my yearning for useful revenue tactics and a sharper business acumen. The book also helped me become a better leader in every aspect of my career and life. By applying these principles in your daily life, not just work, you will see changes (for the better) happen faster than you ever could have imagined. From Impossible to Inevitable should be not just a business book but a high school text!”
—Ryan Donohue, director, Agility Recovery
“I've been a huge fan of Aaron and Jason's ever since I read Predictable Revenue and found SaaStr, but they take it to another level in this book. The depth with which they understand the current talent and culture ecosystem in tech (especially sales) is remarkable. I now feel like I know exactly how my boss and my exec team think about my performance, and how to get ahead in my growing career. Before, I was totally ‘renting’ my job, as Aaron and Jason put it, but now I realize I have to become an ‘owner’ when it comes to my role if I really want to get ahead.”
—Eric Taylor, sales, HackerRank
“I have been following Aaron's and Jason's work for quite a while. For example, when Predictable Revenue came out, I devoured it during a flight to London. Upon landing, I sent an email to my team to have Aaron interviewed for our blog. That interview had the highest measurable traffic, stickiness, and time on page of any other piece of content at the time. And I'm a devout SaaStr reader. Their new book is even better. Its approachable style, with easily identifiable actions that any company could take, makes it my go-to present for any new executive I meet. As someone who's been working in sales and marketing for 20 years, my favorite quote from the book is ‘Your VP Sales has a quota—why doesn't your VP Marketing?’”
—Erik W. Charles, incentives expert, ErikCharles.com
“From Impossible to Inevitable helped me see exactly how to focus on what I am best at. The Sales Specialization section inspired and showed me how to rework my sales system. It's unlike any other sales methodology I've encountered. Most trainers are helping you improve phone or email techniques, but those are a waste of time if the underlying system isn't efficient. I'm already recommending this book to all my sales and marketing friends.”
—Mike Smith, director of partnerships, Touchpoints
“My previous job was running my first subscription business and I learned the hard way that in the new economy, you can't just sell a customer and walk away. I haven't seen a better case for investing in customer success than the way Aaron and Jason lay it out in Part II of this book. They demonstrate why Customer Success is about revenue growth, not customer satisfaction. They include useful details on how to structure a team, including examples of tiered levels of service. I bought this book for my whole team, and many extra copies to give to customers.”
—Nick Mehta, CEO, Gainsight
“If you have ever had a conversation with Aaron about his personal life, you know he is a simple man focused on what is truly important. The same holds true when he writes about how to be successful in the business world. ‘Don't let your exciting vision get in the way of taking the daily baby steps needed to get customers today.’ Such a simple but important truth.”
—Trish Bertuzzi, CEO, The Bridge Group and author, The Sales Development Playbook
“Aaron and Jason are rare experts, who combine real-world (not theoretical) expertise as keynote speakers with an ability to skillfully teach the complexities associated with conquering Big Revenue Goals in a busy world.”
—Barrett Cordero, president, BigSpeak Inc.
“I thought the book would be the same old ideas (invest in people, embrace failure, etc.) I've heard over and over again, but as I pushed through I discovered how many new ideas were here and how old ideas were revitalized and combined with useful details demonstrating how to actually implement them.”
—Kyle Romaniuk, partner, The CHR Group
“As we worked through the Niche Matrix (in Part I) for our key verticals, it was amazing to watch the team learn how to truly value-sell our service to solve our customer pain points and significantly increase our deal sizes in the process. The Embrace Employee Ownership section was also powerful. By asking who owns upgrades and how, our account management leader took ownership of upselling our base, committed the team to double monthly upgrades (a Forcing Function), and worked with the team to decide on key activities to drive results. Within two months, they doubled our monthly upgrade revenue.”
—Larry Coble, LLR Partners
FROM IMPOSSIBLE TO INEVITABLE
How SaaS and Other Hyper-Growth Companies Create Predictable Revenue
Second Edition
AARON ROSS AND JASON LEMKIN
Copyright © 2019 by PebbleStorm, Inc. All rights reserved.
Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.
Published simultaneously in Canada.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, (978) 750-8400, fax (978) 646-8600, or on the Web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, (201) 748-6011, fax (201) 748-6008, or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions.
Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Neither the publisher nor author shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.
For general information on our other products and services or for technical support, please contact our Customer Care Department within the United States at (800) 762-2974, outside the United States at (317) 572-3993 or fax (317) 572-4002.
Wiley publishes in a variety of print and electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-on-demand. If this book refers to media such as a CD or DVD that is not included in the version you purchased, you may download this material at http://booksupport.wiley.com. For more information about Wiley products, visit www.wiley.com.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available:
ISBN 9781119531692 (Hardcover)ISBN 9781119531715 (ePDF)ISBN 9781119531722 (ePub)
Cover Design: WileyCover Image: © Aaron Ross
Preface: Systematizing Success
There's never been an easier time to grow a business. Ironically, though, while everyone else around you seems to be crushing their goals, does it feel like a struggle for you?
If you needed to triple your revenue in the next year or three, would you know exactly how you would do it?
Tripling isn't magic. It's not about the school you went to, luck, or working harder. There's a template that the world's fastest-growing companies follow to achieve and sustain hypergrowth.
Whether you want to add $1 million or $100 million, the fundamentals are the same. You can grow your business 2 to 10 times faster in honorable ways that feel good to you, your employees, and your customers. (In fact, the truth is the best form of sales and marketing.)
This book shows you how to break growth plateaus and get off the up-and-down revenue rollercoaster, showing you how to answer:
“Why aren't you growing faster?”
“What does it take to get to hypergrowth?”
“How do you sustain it?”
LESSONS FROM THE WORLD'S FASTEST-GROWING COMPANIES
The Internet's filled with advice on how to grow your company – some great, some harmful, mostly outdated, or just nice to have. How do you sort through the clutter to figure out the few, big things that will change and sustain your growth rate?
Whatever your business is, rather than a 2% or 20% increase in sales, we want you to find ways to get a 200–1,000% increase in growth by learning from companies like:
Salesforce.com
, the multibillion-dollar, fastest-growing big software company
EchoSign (now Adobe Document Services)
, growing from $0 to $144 million in seven years
… and other hypergrowth companies such as Acquia (a #1 fastest-growing private software company), HubSpot, Marketo, Twilio, and Zuora who've broken (well) past $100 million revenue and billion-dollar valuation marks in record times.
Now if you're like us, you want to know how the heck did they do that?
It wasn't from posting a video that went viral or anything else that would make you say, “oh, they got lucky.” Instead, there are repeatable lessons any company can learn from.
Success can be a system, not random. Revenue and growth can be (mostly) predictable. And they have to be, to take impossible goals and turn them into inevitable success, success far bigger than you can imagine from where you're sitting today.
The Seven Ingredients of Hypergrowth
You're not ready to grow
… until you
Nail a Niche
.
Overnight success is a fairy tale
. You're not going to be magically discovered, so you need sustainable systems that
Create Predictable Pipeline
.
Speeding up growth creates more problems than it solves
. Growth exposes your weaknesses. Things will actually get worse until you
Make Sales Scalable
.
It's hard to build a big business out of small deals
… so figure out how to
Double Your Deal Size
.
It'll take years longer than you want
… don't quit too soon or let a Year of Hell discourage you. Be prepared to
Do the Time
.
Your employees are renting, not owning, their jobs
.
Embrace Employee Ownership
to develop a culture of taking initiative beyond a job description.
If you're an employee,
you're letting frustrations stop, rather than motivate, you
. Stop waiting for someone else to fix it; flip your frustrations to your advantage and
Define Your Destiny
.
Follow the Impossible recipe to kick off your biggest growth spurt yet and make success Inevitable.
PART INail a Niche
The Painful Truth: You've been struggling to grow because you're not ready to grow.
CHAPTER 1“Niche” Doesn't Mean Small
How do you know whether you're ready to grow? Don't let a big vision, or wanting to serve too many kinds of customers, trap you into sounding vague or confusing.
ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE READY TO GROW FASTER?
You're excited about your business, your ideas, products, and services … and you're ready to grow faster. You might be a startup, a consultant, or a Fortune 100 brand.
And you know that lead generation is the #1 lever that drives revenue growth and can create hypergrowth. You've been trying to grow your leads, and thus sales, but it's been harder than you expected … maybe a lot harder.
Are you sure you're ready to grow faster?
Because when it feels like you're swimming upstream every day to generate leads, or to sign new customers from the ones you do get, you usually have a bigger problem. All that time, energy, and money invested in growing new leads and closing sales can be poured into a black hole—if you haven't Nailed a Niche.
You can be a Fortune 100 company, or the greatest expert at organization design, or have a killer SaaS (software as a service) subscription model app for managing employees. But, if you can't predictably go out and generate leads and opportunities where you're needed, win them, and do it profitably, you're gonna struggle. It's frustrating. But there's no shortcut here, whether you're a business or an individual. Struggles often mean there's a niche problem, either at the company, marketing department, or salesperson level.
Clues You Aren't Ready to Grow (Regardless of What the CEO or Board Expects)
You've grown mostly through referrals, word of mouth, and up-/cross-selling.
Inbound or outbound lead generation has been disappointing … or abysmal.
You realize, looking back, that you're dependent on preexisting relationships or a recognized brand to get in the door, even if your product or service is amazing.
You're good at too many things, and struggle focusing on the one best opportunity to sell and deliver over and over again.
Even when you get quality appointments, too few people buy.
If you can't predictably generate leads and opportunities where you're needed, win them, and do it profitably, you're gonna struggle.
Most Frequently Seen When…
You hit a plateau between $1 and $10 million in revenue, and you start trying new kinds of leadgen programs.
When you launch a new product or service or enter a new market.
In getting your first 10–50 customers, getting to product-market fit or a minimum sellable product.
You're in consulting or professional services.
Your company offers a wide range of products and services (Portfolio Attention Deficit Disorder).
Everyone Hates to Admit They're Not Ready to Grow
Swallowing the “we're not ready to grow yet” pill is bitter. Especially when you have a board or CEO breathing down your neck, a payroll to meet, or big family bills.
No one likes admitting they're a nice-to-have rather than a need-to-have. Or that the elevator pitch the CEO came up with is totally off-base and confuses prospects. Or that you can't yet measure or document other customers’ results.
Companies with a large portfolio of products face the same problem. Do your salespeople or customers get confused by all the product options? They don't know what to buy or sell first, and so they struggle along trying to buy or sell a little bit of everything. Confusion stunts growth. A lack of focus distracts you from being “insanely great” at just one thing.
HOW TO KNOW IF YOU'VE NAILED A NICHE
When you're a startup getting to your first million, or launching a new product, lead generation program, or market—one of the indicators that you've Nailed a Niche is that you are able to find and sign up unaffiliated customers. Unaffiliated. Paying. Customers.
One of the indicators that you've Nailed a Niche is that you're consistently able to find and sign up unaffiliated customers.
We don't mean friends of your investors, or your old coworkers or boss. They aren't past customers, partners, or part of your LinkedIn network. They weren't referred to you; they didn't hear about you from a group. They started out “cold” without the advantage of prior relationships.
Whether they found you by coming in through the ether, or whether you went out and pounded the (physical or virtual) pavement to source and close them.
And now they're paying you—profitably.
Because here's the thing: Ten customers may not seem like much. We called these guys “beer money” in the early days at EchoSign. Ten customers was $200 a month, which didn't come close to paying the bills for four engineers and three other guys—it barely paid for beer. But 10 clients are actually amazing. Yes, you may still fail, of course, because of cash-flow issues. But 10 is a first sign of presuccess—even though it's very likely that more than one will turn out to be a dud, while you're learning which customers you can make successful. Because it means three things:
Since you have 10, you can definitely get 20… and then 100. If you can get 10 unaffiliated customers to pay you (no small feat), I guarantee you can get 20. And if you keep going at it, you will get at least to 100. And then 200, at least. At a minimum, you can keep doubling and doubling. I'm not saying it's easy, but it's possible.
More importantly, it's amazing you got those 10. Ten is not a small number! Because why the heck should they trust you, and pay for your product? It stands on its own without you needing a prior relationship. It's a huge vote of confidence. Maybe you were on TechCrunch, Reddit, Bob's Insurance Newsletter, or some blog—great. But in the real world, with Mainstream Buyers, no one has ever heard of you. You're not “the thing” all their friends are buying, making them feel that without it they're being left behind.
This means you built something real. Something valued. Most importantly, it's something you can build on. These 10 customers will give you a roadmap, feedback, and indeed, the path to 1,000 more customers—if you listen carefully. You won't heed all their advice, of course, but the feedback from these first 10 customers won't be from outliers. It will be transformational. I guarantee it.
Because your 1,000th customer most likely will be just like your 10th, in concept and spirit, in category and core problem solved.
At EchoSign, the first unaffiliated customer was a distributed sales manager of a telesales team. The exact industry she was in was unusual (debt consolidation), but digging deeper, the actual use case was exactly the same, in spirit if not in workflow, as 80% or more of the customers that came later. The same as Facebook, as Twitter, as Groupon, as Google, as Verizon, as BT, as Oracle … the same as all of them.
The same core “goodness” that you've built attracts all of them. Of course, you're going to need to build tons more features, mature your product dramatically, and so forth. But the core will be the same goodness as customers 1–10 experienced.
Trust us. Ten customers may not pay the bills. But if you got them from scratch, you have the start of organic leadflow or of some leadgen process that you can replicate. That's really special, and something you can actually build on.
So this is your first time to double down, after Customer 10 … even if it seems way, way smaller than your goals and vision. Forget 1,000: Double them to 20, then to 40, and so on. Compound that 10 month after month, year after year, get the flywheel cranking, and you'll make your big vision inevitable.
ACHIEVE WORLD DOMINATION ONE NICHE AT A TIME
Let's address a misperception right now about the word “niche.” When you Nail a Niche, you're not “thinking small.” You're not limiting your dream. You're not permanently shrinking your addressable market.
Niche here means focused. On a specific target customer with a specific pain. Regardless of how many types of customers you could help, or how many of their problems you could solve.
Don't let your exciting vision or big, hairy, audacious goal get in the way of taking the daily baby steps needed to get customers today.
Hypergrowth doesn't come from selling many things to many markets, covering all your bases (really, dividing your energies). Hypergrowth comes from focusing on where you have the best chances of winning customers, making them successful, building a reputation of tangible results, and then growing from there. For example:
Salesforce.com
started with Sales Force Automation.
Facebook began with Ivy League schools.
PayPal took off with eBay users.
Amazon started with books.
Zappos focused on shoes.
Where's the easiest place for you to build momentum now? What's the path of least resistance to money for you?
Focusing on specific industries or types of customers—like banks, software companies, or large businesses—is part, but not all of it. It also means focusing your unique strengths (not all your strengths) where they can create the most value (not any value), and:
Solve a specific
pain
for
An
ideal
target customer in
A
believable, repeatable
way,
With predictable methods to (a)
find
and (b)
interest
them.
Any kind of specialization that helps you to break through the clutter, stand out, be the best, win, or be unique is valuable.
For example: If you're a company that creates customized solutions for every client, and you need to re-create the wheel from scratch each time, you're going to struggle with a double whammy. First, it'll be harder to market yourself, because really—what problem do you solve? Second, unless you have some kind of repeatable solution, framework, or system—growth is going to be hard. You have to be one stubborn S.O.B. to grow that kind of company. Or lucky—but luck doesn't create sustained success.
If you focus on solving a single problem really well and can adapt as the market evolves, the sky's your limit.
If you focus on solving a single problem really well and can adapt as the market evolves, the sky's your limit.
THE ARC OF ATTENTION
Why is there a niche problem in the first place? It has to do with how people's brains and attention spans work. The Arc of Attention and Trust Gap ideas are vital to understanding why there's a problem, and what to do about it.
When you start a business, most people begin with Early Adopters, as they should. These include networks, friends, friends of friends, and people whom instinctively “get it.” Then, once you hit $1–$10 million in revenue, you usually hit a wall as word-of-mouth and referrals start to plateau. Or, as a large company you might plateau when your new leadgen program, product launch, or market struggles. At some point you will run out of Early Adopters, and will need to figure out how to click with Mainstream Buyers, who don't already know you and don't intuitively get it like Early Adopters.
There's a painful difference to evolve from selling to Early Adopters who trust you, to Mainstream Buyers who don't. Geoff Moore called this “crossing the chasm.” We call it bridging a Trust Gap. Whatever it's called, when you understand why this gap exists in the first place, you'll better know how to cross it.
There's a painful difference to evolve from selling to Early Adopters who trust you, to Mainstream Buyers who don't.
Enter the Arc of Attention (see Figure 1.1).
FIGURE 1.1Arc of Attention
The Right Side—High Trust
On the right side of the spectrum are “Mom/Dad/Best Friends”—the people who know and trust you (or your company/brand), and are therefore willing to give you a big slice of attention just because you asked for it. If you call up a best friend and ask them to meet with you for two hours to review a demo, product, blog post or talk, they will—even if it makes zero sense to them.
This side of the arc also includes the few people who somehow run across your product, as crappy or obtuse as your website is—and just get it. You don't need to explain anything to them, because intuitively they know what you can do, why it matters and how to use you service. All of these Early Adopters are willing to invest a lot more mental energy to figure out what you're doing and how they can benefit. They give you a lot of leeway—which is invaluable in getting a new company, product, or leadgen program off the ground.
But it becomes a liability—and often a rude awakening—when you start expecting everyone to give you that same leeway.
The Left Side—No Trust
On the opposite end, there are the people who have never heard of you or your company. When people don't know you, they'll only give you a tiny sliver of their attention to figure you out. If they don't click with you within that window, they move on.
The more connection you have with them right away, the more leeway they'll give you. The less you have, the faster you lose them. Some sample (nonscientific) windows:
A cold email or online ad: A 0.3- to 3-second window before they engage or move on
A cold call: A 3- to 30-second window
Walking door-to-door: A 3- to 60-second window
Compare these to:
A referral: 15 minutes–1 hour
A best friend or parent: Unlimited (in fact, you may be the one who wants to limit the time!)
This is the Trust Gap: The difference between marketing to people who already know us or our brand, and people who don't, and aren't willing to invest anything to figure us out. And the difference between being able to market to Early Adopters (15% of the market) versus Mainstream Buyers (85% of the market). It affects everything related to how you market and sell.
This difference between Early Adopters and Mainstream Buyers can be huge and easily underestimated. You may expect jumping the gap to be doable, like crossing a river from one side to the other. But it's more likely to be the Grand Canyon. Or if you're completely dependent on relationships, it's an Earth-to-Moon-sized gap.
The whole point of Nailing a Niche is to help you cross the Trust Gap, moving from depending on buyers on the right side (trust) to being able to better market and sell to buyers on the left side (no trust).
You have to either (a) find a way to fit your message into that slice of attention, or (b) expand the amount of attention they're willing to give you.
Everything we're doing in the Niche part of the book is to help you cross this gap.
Assume You Are Marketing to Fourth Graders
With those tiny slices of attention that “cold” people are willing to give you, it's similar to the mental investment of a third- or fourth grader. So your message has to be simple for them to both understand and easily act on, or else they'll move on before ever giving it a chance.
Your message has to be simple for them to both understand and easily act on, or else they'll move on before ever giving it a chance.
This is why short and sweet emails and videos tend to work better than long emails and videos as first touches with new people. People see a long email or video from someone they don't know, and they just aren't willing to invest in consuming it.
Perhaps if you're a genius copywriter, you can make them work, but for us regular people, shorter is better—at least for first contact. The more your messages are simple to understand and easy to answer, so that they'll fit into your prospects’ window of attention, the more effective they'll be.
You can watch this in yourself: What goes through your head when you get a long note from someone, even someone you know? What about a short one? Do you see how the effort you're willing to give that messages changes so dramatically depending on who it comes from, how simple it is, and what they are asking for?
It's also why appealing to their dinosaur brains—rather than the purely logical brain—works.
Speak to the Dinosaur Brain
Reptiles think with their eyes, not their brains—and so do we! Dinosaur-brain thinking (the same thing, but dinosaurs are cooler than reptiles) isn't about thinking consciously and making logical decisions—it's about reacting.
There are different reasons something appeals to us at the dinosaur brain level, before our conscious minds have time to process it, such as:
Newness
Contrast (“There's a bucket of blue pens with one orange pen on the top”)
Movement/speed
Surprises
Details
Visuals
This is why you'll see banner ads with a color that's different from the page background and with moving pictures, to combine the attention-getting elements of visuals, contrast, and movement. Or why video-sharing sites have so many videos titled like He Hated His Boss for Two Years until This Happened with a picture, combining visuals and anticipated surprise and detail. And it works, at least until you learn from watching several that the videos are rarely as interesting as the titles, and you start ignoring them.
So, be intriguing and attractive, without overpromising—at least not too often.
Learning how to reframe your ideas to appeal to people's dinosaur brains makes sense when you consider the tiny window of attention you get. Even if it's frustratingly hard to do at first, or feels sales-y. You can't fight the Arc of Attention, even if you believe “My stuff is so amazing and necessary that it shouldn't need to be sold. Plus we're donating money to save trees, so there's no reason anyone won't want to buy!”
Online Resources:www.FromImpossible.com/resources.
CHAPTER 2Signs of Slogging
If growing is harder than slogging through mud, it's probably because of one these reasons.
ARE YOU A NICE-TO-HAVE?
Do you believe your intended buyers need what you're offering? Or are you a nice-to-have? One clear sign that you're a nice-to-have: Everyone you show your product to says “cool!,” but no one buys.
Consumers don't buy what they need; they buy what they want. How much do consumers spend on Porsches and ice cream compared to broccoli and psychotherapy?
But businesses don't buy nice-to-haves. For example:
Marketers
want
a beautiful website—but they
need
a website that converts visitors to outcomes such as leads or purchases.
CEOs
want
happy employees—but they
need
people to show up and do their jobs, for products to be released on time, or for cash flow to be improved.
VPs of Sales
want
increased sales productivity—but they
need
and
buy
what contributes to it, such as leads, accurate reporting tools, and training.
Venture capitalists
want
to invest in honorable founders—but they
need
to generate above-average returns, which may or may not come from companies with honorable founders.
It takes a lot of energy to buy and use something new, so if you're a nice-to-have, it won't stick. Nice-to-haves fall to the bottom of the “must do” list.
If the buyer doesn't need your solution, they won't be motivated to go through all the work to convince their people, justify the purchase, roll it out, and get people to use it.
What problem is painful enough that a team of people will spend both their money and time to fix it?
If you are solving a need, how can you describe what you do differently, so prospects also see it that way?
What differentiates the customers who
need
you from the ones who don't?
Where can you create the most financial value?
Where can you get permission to create case studies or get references? (With some types of markets or customers these are almost impossible to get.)
How can you “sell money”?
How can you sell “things”?
“Sell money” means proving to customers that your product will help them make more money, spend less of it, reduce the risk of losing it, or stay compliant (avoiding fines and legal risk). Demonstrate how spending money with you will make them more money.
Make money by proving to customers that your product will help them make more money, spend less of it, reduce the risk of losing it, or stay compliant.
If you say you'll “increase revenue” or “decrease costs,” you sound just like everyone else. What's equivalent to money in their mind—leads? Close rates? Social activity? Collections?
Employee engagement or fulfillment? Although we know engaged employees and fulfillment are vital, how do you prove to customers that you can help them make money with better employee relations, or with better resources and tools for their employees? How can you make the case that your product is needed?
Example: What ACME Learned from Failing at Outbound Lead Generation
A $15 million SaaS company, let's call them ACME Corp., came to us and said, “We need to grow, we need more leads!” ACME had grown to that point by being a partner of Salesforce.com and getting referrals from them. These referrals closed at a high rate, quickly. Clearly it was because they were referrals. ACME was growing, but wanted to grow faster, to double their rate with paid lead generation. Referrals and organic growth weren't enough. But ACME assumed that if they just got twice as many leads, they could grow twice as fast.
Trouble Clue #1
: They'd been trying different online and offline marketing campaigns for the past three years, with results ranging from abysmal to crummy.
Trouble Clue #2
: They started an outbound prospecting program (with Aaron's help) and totally failed. A total
zero
. It took four months (well, on top of the prior three years), but the key learning was that
ACME wasn't ready to grow faster
.
This company hadn't Nailed a Niche. The signs were there before. But they didn't want to accept it until they tried outbound marketing and hit a wall. Any kind of paid or nonorganic lead generation (like marketing or prospecting) can be a forcing function that makes you confront the reality of whether you've nailed a niche or not. If it doesn't work, you need to rethink your target customer … and possibly your solution.
ACME was in a noisy, commoditized market. All of ACME's target prospects already had something “good enough.” Their targets’ pains weren't ones ACME could credibly solve. To the prospects, anything ACME could offer beyond what they already had was just a nice-to-have, and not worth the pain of switching systems. However excited the ACME team was about their own stuff, prospects didn't get it. They didn't need ACME's solution
Target, Pain, and Solution
Your niche isn't just picking an industry vertical or target, though being selective about whom you're targeting is important. It also sits at the intersection of the pain they have and your solution (Figure 2.1).
FIGURE 2.1Where is your sweet spot of target, pain, and solution?
Now, if you're in the same situation, do you blame the prospects for not getting it—or do you admit you have work to do?
BIG COMPANIES SUFFER, TOO
A top-five global software company hired us to help the salespeople of a particular division improve their prospecting. These salespeople, with limited time, were spending too much time researching rather than campaigning. When they did call or email people, they rarely got responses. The salespeople were as frustrated as the execs: “We want to prospect, but what we're doing is just a waste of time.”
Ideally they should create a specialized sales team of junior prospectors to do most of the outbound prospecting, but that was impractical. They needed to do something now.
This team of salespeople sold to $1 billion-plus companies, like Bank of America, who often had multiple divisions. The company had a product list of at least 10 or 15 respected technology solutions they could pitch, to pretty much any kind of executive: IT, sales, marketing, finance, HR … basically anyone.
Their email, phone, and time management techniques weren't the main problem. They suffered from selling too many things to too many targets, and bouncing around instead of focusing.
They'd target the CEO of a bank on marketing, then a CTO for databases, HR for people management, and so on. It's the same Nail a Niche problem we've discussed, just in a different format.
The point is, Nailing a Niche (Figure 2.2) isn't just a problem for startups and small businesses. You don't solve it once. It becomes a recurring problem as you expand your lead generation programs, geographies, teams, and product portfolio. Your CMO, division, or individual salespeople may need to repeatedly nail down who is being targeted, who needs (not wants) you most, why should they buy, and for how much money And to make it about helping them, not just about you closing another deal.
FIGURE 2.2Nailing a Niche is the first step of turning struggle into success.
How do you make it all about them, not all about you?
It's hard to resist going on and on and on … to buyers about all the wonderful ways you can help them. But if you keep doing that rather than specializing, you're more likely to confuse buyers than excite them.
CASE STUDY: WHERE AARON WENT WRONG
My income increased 10× over four years, from $67,000 to $720,000, while I (usually) worked 20–30 hours a week. And, at the same time, my family grew from zero to 10 kids. I couldn't have done any of this without Nailing my Niche, specializing 100% in an opportunity where I had the easiest time making money—that is, the easiest time creating tangible results for others—and eliminating all my nice-to-haves.
After working at Salesforce.com for four years, most of which was spent creating and building the inside sales team that did all the outbound prospecting, I left Salesforce.com in late 2006. I'd been telling myself I didn't want to do sales consulting, but some projects came up through friends that sounded interesting, and I could use the income. I started early at Salesforce.com, when there were about 150 employees, but not early enough to make much money there, beyond a nice bonus that paid off my divorce debt.
These friends, my first clients, were my Early Adopters. They hired me because they knew me, not because I had a crystal-clear program and value proposition at the time—because I didn't.
I then spent a while at venture capital Alloy Ventures, researching business-to-business lead generation ideas. This led to a bunch of ideas and possibilities I could pursue. The result: choice paralysis. I had a lot of exciting ideas, and didn't want to pick “just one.” When I felt like I could do anything, what did I want to do? I had no idea.
I left to visit a friend in China for a couple of weeks, to get away and reflect. At some point during the trip, I still had no idea what I wanted to do next, but I realized:
I didn't want to start a software company anymore.
I didn't want to raise money to start a company.
I wanted to be able to work on what I wanted, when I wanted, and with whom I wanted.
I wanted to make as much money as I wanted, doing what I loved. I had no idea what that was or how I'd do it, but I'd figure it out along the way.
What I loved to do most was partnering and working with people I trust. In other words,
what
I did, didn't feel as important as
with whom
I did it.
What I did, didn't feel as important as with whom I did it.
So, for the next three years, 2007–2010, I tried different niches, bouncing around like so many companies I've seen—software or services—trying different combinations of who to go after and what to offer. Nothing seemed to “click” into the breakout success I'd hoped for and wanted. I wanted people to get excited about what I had to offer, line up to buy it, and then love it. I tried a number of products.
Selling “money”
: I started BlackBox Revenues with a partner, Erythean Martin, to consult with companies building outbound prospecting teams. Responsys (sold to Oracle in 2014) was a first client, and the system helped them grow 10× in five years, from $20 million to $200 million.
But I saw the sales consulting role (mistakenly, it turns out) as just a “day job” to pay the bills while I developed two ideas I was more passionate about. So, I didn't triple down here to figure my model out. Instead, I spent more attention on. …
Selling “fulfillment”
: Under
UniqueGenius.com
I tried personal coaching, to help people find a life purpose and make money from it, combining meaning and money.
Selling “freedom”
: With my first book,
CEOFlow: Turn Your Employees into Mini-CEOs
, I tried organizational design and CEO- and team-coaching.
Need versus Nice
While at the time I felt more innate passion for the ideas behind Unique Genius and CEOFlow, both were much harder to market and sell than my sales consulting. In both cases, I worked on these ideas part time over a few years, slowly turning them from blogs into events, and then into a series of Unique Genius videos and the CEOFlow book.
Along the way, I remember having conversations with people who I thought clearly needed and would benefit from the ideas and the coaching—but they didn't buy. And I just got so frustrated in going through this time and time again, iterating new programs, messages, and proposals, bouncing along making around $5,000–$7,000 a month. Hey, it wasn't bad money, but it wasn't anything close to what I believed was possible, or what I saw other people doing online. “Compare and despair” was a close friend of mine.
I'd bought into the “If you build it, they'll come” fairy tale. I had misguided expectations of what it'd take to grow an expertise-based business. I vastly underestimated the focus, energy, and time it would take to get either brand off the ground.
Neither venture took off the way I'd expected or hoped, even though I believed they were killer brands and ideas. In a parallel universe, if I'd picked one and tripled down, going all in, it could have taken off faster. But it would still have been more of a slog than I wanted.
Looking back, my biggest mistake was that I hadn't Nailed a Niche. I wasn't ready to grow.
A distinct learning from this is that while people were interested in purpose and freedom, what they wanted to buy (at least from me) was money, which at the time was through outbound sales consulting. One was a need, the others were nice.
When people felt that they didn't have enough money (revenue), they couldn't focus on anything else. It was money first, second, and third—then freedom or purpose after that. It's hard to think about much else when you're struggling to pay the bills.
It's hard to think about much else when you're struggling to pay the bills.
Then Came a Forcing Function
When I remarried in 2011, everything changed. I went from being single with low expenses to having a wife and two children. And within a few weeks, we also had a new baby on the way. We needed a bigger apartment.
We could uproot our kids and ourselves and move from (relatively expensive) Santa Monica to a cheaper area. Or I could grow my business. I chose growth. And I kept choosing growth as we continued to add children to our family, year after year, and had to move to bigger and bigger houses.
But to grow, I had to pick the niche that would be the easiest to make money with. I couldn't afford the luxury of avoiding the truth that what I was most passionate about creating was, painfully, still a nice-to-have to others. Given more time, I could figure out the who, how, and where in order to make them need-to-haves … but I didn't have that time.
I made money easiest when I helped other companies grow sales with outbound prospecting, through PredictableRevenue.com. I finally published the Predictable Revenue book, and took the plunge—to specialize in helping companies build outbound prospecting programs. Something I'd held back from doing 100%—not so much in time, but in commitment and focus. I put every other business or fun idea, all my nice-to-haves, on the backburner indefinitely.
When people ask me how much work it took to write and publish Predictable Revenue, I don't have a simple answer. It took:
Six years of baby steps of blogging
Two days to put a full draft together
Three months to edit, design, and self-publish
