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Breaking Into SaaS Sales With No Experience | Dominating SaaS Sales #1
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Breaking Into SaaS Sales With No Experience |
Dominating SaaS Sales #1
Starting as a Sales Development Representative.
BowTiedDingo
May 20, 2021
17
7
First post of the SaaS Sales series!
Welcome to the first real value add post in BowTiedDingo. The question of how to
get into SaaS sales came up from a few different places in the jungle, so I
thought it would be fitting to answer questions I’ve received immediately.
This series will start laying out the different progression steps in a SaaS
Sales career path, then move into how to kill it at each different role, then
into specific guides and learnings.
For context I have done SaaS Sales for years. During this time I have gone
through many interviews, gotten many job offers, promotions and failed a lot in
the middle. The main rule is don’t fail when it counts. There are a few sales
veterans in the Jungle and I am sure some will have different opinions and it it
worth listening to them as well, all that is contained in BTD is pulled from
personal experience and holds the my main learnings that will help you.
Why work in SaaS Sales?
The short answer for this one is is easy. MONEY!
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Enterprise SaaS sales provides a quick career path to being a top earner. You
are paid well, usually a base salary, plus commission on what you sell, this is
down to your own performance (and if you’re in the jungle and reading this, you
can PERFORM). Think of all of the commission funnelling straight into Eth,
WAGMI.
On top of that, it allows you to do it without giving up your life! Most people
I have worked with and have met actually like their job. They also have time
outside of work to do what they want, and they are able to work remotely.
This is not only a good career, it is a career you can enter with no experience
and no qualifications. I’ve worked with people who have no degree and got their
first sales role straight out of high school who are making more than the rest
of their graduating class. This is a hard work, ability to learn thing.
Thinking more long term here, we want to eventually leave the career path and
have multiple income streams that are running while we are asleep so that we
don’t need to work for anyone else. The skills you learn in sales are going to
teach you how to run a profitable business. How to sell value, interact with
investors, how to organise your time, build a network. You will come out of a
few years of sales far more prepared to be successful than anybody straight out
of a business degree.
In short SaaS Sales allows you to get paid well on your own performance from
anywhere in the world, without taking over your life, all the while teaching you
how to leave your job and work for yourself. What could be better?
Also is anyone else thinking sitting on the beach closing deals right now?
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What would the career progression look like?
So the aim here is to get to Enterprise Account Executive (EAE) as fast as
possible, this is where you’re going to be making the most money, and best ROI
for your time. Everything before that, every role, every company, is just a
stepping stone.
This will take some time though. If you’re talented maybe 3 years. This is
possible but would be a massive outlier I would say average is 5-7 years of
experience to get there.
The general progression looks like this:
Sales Development Representative (SDR) - 6 months - 2 years
Account Executive (AE) - 2 year+
Enterprise Account Executive
Some companies usually depending on size put extra steps in between like
splitting SME Account Executive and Mid Market Account Executive. This is just
different titles along the same time frame, if you do find yourself at a company
like this, same rules as always, try to move up as quickly as possible and don’t
get pigeon holed as the small business guy.
What is an SDR?
So that’s it? Get a job as an “SDR” and work my way up? Dingo that sounds easy!
Good news, in theory it is, but there is a lot to learn, and I’m not going to
sugar coat it, the early steps are A GRIND. Being an SDR is one of the hardest
roles to do in a business, not because it is technically difficult, but it wears
your down. This is a role you want to take because it gives you experience and a
foot in the door, then over-perform and get promoted as fast as possible.
The role of an SDR is to cold call as many businesses within the Ideal Customer
Profile (ICP) as possible during the day and set up demo meetings for the
Account Executive team to take and turn into signed contracts.
This role has a lot of rejection, and teaches you a lot very quickly. A lot of
people hate getting cold calls and are going to be angry off the bat, you might
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just catch someone on a bad day and they choose to take it out on a stranger,
you will definitely fuck up and someone will just be done with you and let
loose. There is a bright side to this, you learn to deal with rejection FAST.
When someone telling you no, or yelling at you for no particular reason becomes
normal, your ability to control emotions is on a level people who have never
done sales don’t understand.
The role also teaches you the value of time. Every meeting you set for an AE is
going to be scrutinised and unless is it qualified (There are many ways sales
organisations qualify meetings, we will just talk generally) to the point where
they are convinced the deal will close, you’re going to get some heavy push
back. You will learn that every meeting you book is you making a business case
on why the company should invest resources into the thing you just did.
An SDR is expected to learn the companies product, take it to the front lines
with cold outreach to decision makers who have many years more experience and a
lot more seniority in their businesses, interrupt their day and convince them to
set a meeting with a stranger. You will need to learn business acumen, emotional
intelligence, grit, and sales skills.
The SDR role will have KPIs (All sales roles will have targets that you need to
hit). Depending on the business you’re going to have to hit a number of calls
daily (I’ve seen number of cold calls per day required between 40 and 300.),
number of qualified meetings booked/held, amount of money closed from your
meetings, etc. As far as I (and your sales manager) are concerned you do not
miss these, no matter what it takes.
Now that I’ve scared you I should mention being an SDR can be a lot of fun,
learn not to take things other people say too seriously but always be open to
learning and you can get a lot out of your time in the role. Plus it doesn’t
take too long to get promoted out of it.
Most companies will promote you out of the role in 6 months to 2 years. I would
say if the average time it takes to move from an SDR to AE is more than 1 year,
you should find a different company.
Now For The Fun Part!
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Now time to start talking about how to get the job, and what to do when you get
it.
Lets Prepare
There are a few things you should do/know before you start applying for jobs,
we’ll run through what I think the essentials are here.
Types of Company to work for
This is an important one, where you cut your teeth will determine the training
you will receive, the pay you will be trying to move up from, and the amount if
time you are spending in the early (worst paid) stages of your career.
Large companies like Salesforce, SAP and Oracle are going to have the best
training programs for new employees. Some of these companies offer entire
internships that are similar to doing a certificate in sales and prepare you
like a school. These companies do though often have higher requirements like a
degree, and the sales culture is usually more cut throat - hit target or else.
There are also other things like your market being split up so you can only
target certain company verticals or locations when you are calling. Something to
keep in mind. These companies usually keep SDRs longer before promotion as well.
Smaller businesses and start-ups are going to be the opposite, you will
generally find that they don’t have a great training program and though your
manager and other reps can help, there will be a lot of self learning in there.
Degree requirements are usually non-existent. The main upside here is
progression though. If you find a late stage start-up or a successful small
business, then you can find a way up out of SDR in 6 month to a year instead of
the occasionally 2 years at the larger companies.
Which do I choose?
This is entirely up to you, personally though I would suggest the smaller
companies. The large companies may have training and look better on your resume,
but a successful salesman isn’t going to be told no just for a lack of brand
name on their resume, and the time lost being an SDR for another year is just
not worth it in any way to me. Get to AE as fast as possible, make the money and
have a better life.
Your CV
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Next you want to prepare your CV.
I’ve used and recommended people use the CV template posted on Wall Street
Playboys back in the day (Message me for a copy if you want). But the general
rule I have is keep it simple, black and white, and show everything in a single
page. No photos and assume no hiring manager is ever going to look at page 2.
If you’ve never achieved anything, let it be minimalistic. The first sales role
I got, my resume had one hospitality job, and my high school education.
We’re going to try and bypass the resume queue by getting a recommendation into
the company anyway, and you can talk your way around anything in an interview.
During this prep, if you don’t have a LinkedIn, or it’s not up to date, make one
now. Professional looking photo (Or as close as you can get, if you only have
photos looking stoned, homeless, or like a hippie, best to keep it the default
placeholder), your work history, your skills, and your education. That’s all.
Do some reading
Start reading everything you can on being an SDR, check out the sales reddit
(Actually a good resource), read articles from the gong.io. You don’t need to be
an expert, but having a good knowledge of the type of job WILL help.
If you like books, my recommendation would be Fanatical Prospecting by Jeb
Blount. This is in my mind mandatory reading for SDRs.
Options for extra credit
If you really want to do this job, why not start doing the SDR job as your own
business first? You will go in with experience and be earning money on the side
anyway. Check out @saascapo on twitter. He has a THREAD that will walk you
through this step by step. Guarantee if you follow it successfully, any sales
org is going to snap you up.
Start Applying
Here’s the thing, you’re applying for an appointment setting entry level role.
There will be a lot of competition who on paper are all completely
indistinguishable from each other, and you are no different. So to combat that,
we are going to have a 2 pronged approach to applying for SDR roles.
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The first is traditional
This is the boring one, and the least effective one, but you are going to do it
anyway. People get jobs with it, and the second prong attack should be backed up
with the fundamentals (In sales always go back to the fundamentals and perform
consistently, you will always in).
You will set up a LinkedIn job search to give you daily updates on SDR roles
that fit the profile of the type of company you chose earlier, set it for your
location and remote work. Start applying to all of them where you fit the
requirements. SDR roles do not need any prior experience for most companies,
some will have them, if you’re close but not 100% apply anyway, if they are
crazy high move on, you don’t want that role anyway. They will abuse you or the
recruiter is dumb as shit.
Keep doing this daily, only one role per company, but every company that comes
up.
While you are applying you want to start keeping a list of your favourites. The
companies you most want to work for who are actively hiring. This list will be
used for approach 2.
Being and SDR to get a job as an SDR
The second approach is cold outreach until you get a recommendation to the
hiring manager from someone internally. Cold outreach is what the job entails,
so it is obviously a good idea to prove you can do it anyway.
You’re going to start finding the emails of the Sales VPs, Sales Managers and
Inside Sales Managers from your list of preferred companies. DO NOT blow up the
emails of every person in the sales leadership team. Start with the VP and work
your way down one at a time.
You want to draft up a polite and well thought out email to the person saying
that you found. This should be compelling and include a call to action. I would
recommend it askes them to jump on a quick phone call. They probably won’t say
yes to the call, but you might get intro’d to the hiring manager.
Just look up cold email templates, gong is a great resource, I like content from
HubSpot. Just look for something that you can repurpose as outreach to the sales
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leadership. You will stand out doing this, you’re reaching out to a decision
maker with the skills you plan to use to make them money.
I also recommend adding and reaching out via LinkedIn message to other SDRs at
the company. There is often a recommendation bonus where employees will be paid
if someone they recommend is hired, this will allow you to jump the queue for
applicants, but won’t look as good as getting recommended by the VP.
In your LinkedIn message just say you are applying for a role and was wondering
if you could ask them a few questions about the company and job. Use this to
also see if you really do want to work there. After chatting back and forth ask
if they know who is in charge of hiring or could recommend you.
Don’t be surprised if you get very low response rates from the VPs, might even
be 1 out of 200, just keep going until you have people reply. Get used to the
low rates now, because cold outreach is hard.
Interviewing
Congratulations! You’ve gotten an interview, now what?
Honestly this is my favourite part, this is actually sales. You get to step into
a room (Or zoom call) with people and you get to sell a product (Yourself) to a
qualified buyer. This is the whole reason you did any of the previous steps!
Interviews are pretty simple, google standard interview questions, interview
questions for sales etc. Check out the company on Glassdoor in case there are
tips on what the interview process is like.
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE prepare a pitch on what the company does before going in.
You will be asked “So tell me what you know about X COMPANY”. Say from your
understanding it is… and pitch the company like you would on a call. BowTiedBull
example “From my understaning, BowTiedBull is a brand that attracts high IQ,
high potential, and successful people who want to continue to improve. BTB
provides education products centred around Crypto, and DeFi, and use those
products to help improve the financial future of their audience, while having a
positive effect on the finance system as a whole.”
If you have no sales experience, have a personal story of where you had to sell
in your everyday life. If you have no education experience, be prepared to talk
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about your drive to actually work.
I would recommend going in saying you’re specifically going in looking for an
SDR role because of the sales skills you learn, that you want to pursue SaaS
sales as a career long term, and you want to cold call (No one wants to cold
call).
Have a confident, energetic but not manic air about you. Don’t be cocky, just
confident and cool. DO NOT LIE, feel free to bend the truth, but not completely
untrue stories or skills you don’t actually have, these are sales people, they
smell bullshit a mile away.
And if you don’t get the job so be it, there are a million others, keep to the
basics and I guarantee you will win the long game.
I would also recommend preparing a 30, 60, 90 day plan. This will impress the
interviewer and show you are serious. Look it up, there are great resources
available
Email me at dingo@degenisland.asia if you want to discuss interview prep, I am
happy to help.
What do I do now?
So now you’ve got the job, what do you do?
If you didn’t before, read Fanatical Prospecting, it has gone from recommended
reading to required reading since you signed that contract.
You want to hustle like crazy. Hit the ground running and meet every target you
have as fast as possible. You want to get out of the SDR role in 6 months.
I will have a follow up guide on how to succeed as an SDR soon, until then,
action this and get a new career.
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Launched a year ago
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BowTiedFish Jun 30, 2021
Liked by BowTiedDingo
I'm currently involved in sales as a director of client relations for a small managed service provider.
Is it possible to laterally transfer to a SaaS AE? I currently sell not only SaaS but IaaS and PaaS so i'm
not as narrowly defined. My issue with my current role is that i'm only commission based off the
labor I sell. I also get paid a one time payment if I bring a new client onboard through my own
marketing.
1 Reply
2 replies by BowTiedDingo and others
Anon Aug 18, 2021
Hey I'm an accountant trying to pivot to accounting saas sales. Found a promising opportunity-should I revamp my resume for the sales position or just send them my CPA resume as is?
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