pitching every midsize business in america (for fun and profit) (anand kukarni, co-founder,...
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Pitching Every Small & Midsize Business in America (for fun… and profit)
Anand Kulkarni Co-founderLeadGenius @leadgenius
Who’s talking?
• Co-founder / Prez
LeadGenius.com
• Ran sales at LeadGenius
for 4 years, with a network
of 500 virtual SDRs
• ex-PhD from Berkeley, NSF Fellow
LeadGenius software manages outbound / account-based sales for fast-growth companies:
• building lists of target accounts
• mapping decision
makers at accounts
• launching customized
prospecting email from
sales reps
The inside view on lead generation and outbound processes.
• I’ve had an inside look at how
dozens of companies have set
up their outbound sales
processes.
• Both startups and enterprises • 1-person operations to 500-
SDR powerhouses
• We eat our own dogfood!
Today’s Story
• In 2013, one of our customers approached me with a
special request: to find and pitch (almost) every small
and midsize business in America.
Today’s Story
• In 2013, one of our customers approached me with a
special request: to find and pitch (almost) every small
and midsize business in America.
• This is how I did it.
What I’ll share with you today:
• Tales of how we helped a
customer identify and pitch
every small and midsize
business in America!
What I’ll share with you today:
• Tales of how we helped a
customer identify and pitch
every small and midsize
business in America!
• How you can try these neat
tricks at home inside your
own organization!
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“Once you’ve found product-market fit,the only acceptable limits on your sales growth are:
* How fast you can hire top talent. * How fast you can fill your funnel with leads.”
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“Once you’ve found product-market fit,the only acceptable limits on your sales growth are:
* How fast you can hire top talent. * How fast you can fill your funnel with leads.”
— Parker Conrad, Zenefits Fastest-growing SAAS company of all time.
The way “filling your funnel” with SMBs used to work:
• Marketing buys a giant list of
names, emails and phone numbers
(also, buy lots and lots of ads)
• Sales hires a huge, costly, and
hungry sales staff
• Hungry salespeople work their way
down that lead list with cold calls,in-person visits
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This keeps sales & marketing busy, but…
• Marketing spends thousands /
millions on list buys & ads
• Sales spends $60K-$100K / year
per SMB rep working their way
down the lists
• 2% of the leads convert per month
• 98% of the contacts die
• That’s a huge amount of wasted budget.
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Is there a better way?
• Let’s build an outbound SMB
program to pitch everybody in the
country first.
• It’s going to be driven by sales –
so sales is going to write a
message to each prospect.
• If someone says they’re interested,
we’ll point them to sales.
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Let’s go get them.• Collect data at scale.
We built a list of every small business in the whole country
(engineering optional!)
• Learn their pain.We researched relevant data aboutevery one of those customers to pre-qualify
• Pitch at scale.We wrote each one of those customers a targeted, personal message from a salesperson
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Counting them Up• There are 27,908,021 American businesses according
to the 2012 US Census.
• 6,049,655 of those employ more than one person.
Counting them Up• There are 27,908,021 American businesses according
to the 2012 US Census.
• 6,049,655 of those employ more than one person.
(Those are the interesting ones.)
Counting them Up• There are 27,908,021 American businesses according
to the 2012 US Census.
• 6,049,655 of those employ more than one person.
(Those are the interesting ones.)
How would you get them?
How did I get this data?You can go to a series of websites: • Yelp (47M establishments)
• CrunchBase (650K Companies)
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How did I get this data?You can go to a series of websites: • Yelp (47M establishments)
• CrunchBase (650K Companies)
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How did I get this data?You can go to a series of websites: • Yelp (47M establishments)
• CrunchBase (650K Companies)
• AngelList (289K Companies)
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How did I get this data?You can go to a series of websites: • Yelp (47M establishments)
• CrunchBase (650K Companies)
• AngelList (289K Companies)
• Manta
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How did I get this data?You can go to a series of websites: • Yelp (47M establishments)
• CrunchBase (650K Companies)
• AngelList (289K Companies)
• Manta
• Secretary of State Databases
(everything else)
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How did I get this data?You can go to a series of websites: • Yelp (47M establishments)
• CrunchBase (650K Companies)
• AngelList (289K Companies)
• Manta
• Secretary of State Databases
(everything else)
We didn’t go to… • Data.com
• Dunn & Bradstreet30
How did I get this data?For each site: • Put every business on the site
into a CSV file
• Figure out the business owner(s)
• Figure out the owner’s email address
• Verify it
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How did I get this data?For each site: • Put every business on the site
into a CSV file
• Figure out the business owner(s)
• Figure out the owner’s email address
• Verify it
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How did I get this data?For each site: • Put every business on the site
into a CSV file
• Figure out the business owner(s)
• Figure out the owner’s email address
• Verify it
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How did I get this data?For each site: • Put every business on the site
into a CSV file
• Figure out the business owner(s)
• Figure out the owner’s email address
• Verify it
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How did I get this data?For each site: • Put every business on the site
into a CSV file
• Figure out the business owner(s)
• Figure out the owner’s email address
• Verify it
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How did I get this data?For each site: • Put every business on the site
into a CSV file
• Figure out the business owner(s)
• Figure out the owner’s email address
• Verify it
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I’m assuming you’re not using developers to:
• Write crawlers, build machine learning systems, get fancy
Virtual sales backup
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In-person SDR:$80K/year (full-time)Slow to hireCompetitive retention
Virtual staffers:$10/hr-$25/hr (contract)Unlimited, scalable supplyDedicated + motivated
Who should do the work?
Why not pitch every business the same way?• If we’re going to reach out to everybody in the country…
let’s not waste the pitch!
• Personalization works
• How can we do it at scale?
We researched each prospect at scale!
• Datanyze & BuiltWith:Look up the lists of technologies
used by each company
• LinkedIn:Look up the job history of each
prospect at a company.
We researched each prospect at scale!
• LinkedIn connections – who do
you know in common?
• Coworkers – who else works
there on their team?
• Social media activity – have they
complained about your
competitors?
• Product usage – what are these
folks using?
• Hiring patterns – are they hiring
for roles that would use your
product?
Software for Emailing
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This market’s exploding!
• Tout
• Yesware
• Outreach.io
• Sidekick (Hubspot)
• PersistIQ
• Quickmail
We ended up rolling our ownso that we could rapidly classify replies.
Strategy
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Set up unique campaigns for
each state and industry.
Send prospecting messages fromindividual sales reps – not marketing
messages.
Use all the data we collected to make sure
the messages were personalized to the
person, business, and need.
Pitching leads
From: [email protected]: [email protected]: Michael said you needed insurance?
Hi Sarah,
I saw you guys were hiring for HR. We know each other through Michael James and I wanted to see if we might be able to help you scale your HR practices. I have an HR tool that automates your insurance selection. Let me know if you’d like to chat further – we’re doing this for SoldLead8 already.
BTW, congrats on your recent round!
Cheers!AK
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Subject line = crucial.Don’t use “quick question!”
Pitching leads
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Make it a custom, handwritten email
Don’t be salesy! Be helpful.
From: [email protected]: [email protected]: Michael said you needed insurance?
Hi Sarah,
I saw you guys were hiring for HR. We know each other through Michael James and I wanted to see if we might be able to help you scale your HR practices. I have an HR tool that automates your insurance selection. Let me know if you’d like to chat further – we’re doing this for SoldLead8 already.
BTW, congrats on your recent round!
Cheers!AK
Pitching leads
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Be genuine + helpful – don’t spam.Show social proof. Prove you’re not a robot – include personal
Double-Tap: LinkedIn profile view on the same date!
From: [email protected]: [email protected]: Michael said you needed insurance?
Hi Sarah,
I saw you guys were hiring for HR. We know each other through Michael James and I wanted to see if we might be able to help you scale your HR practices. I have an HR tool that automates your insurance selection. Let me know if you’d like to chat further – we’re doing this for SoldLead8 already.
BTW, congrats on your recent round!
Cheers!AK
Mass customization
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Binary buying signal (compelling event – one of four possibilities)
From: [email protected]: [email protected]: Michael said you needed insurance?
Hi Sarah,
I saw you guys were hiring for HR. We know each other through Michael James and I wanted to see if we might be able to help you scale your HR practices. I have an HR tool that automates your insurance selection. Let me know if you’d like to chat further – we’re doing this for SoldLead8 already.
BTW, congrats on your recent round!
Cheers!AK
Mass customization
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LinkedIn… (obviously)
From: [email protected]: [email protected]: Michael said you needed insurance?
Hi Sarah,
I saw you guys were hiring for HR. We know each other through Michael James and I wanted to see if we might be able to help you scale your HR practices. I have an HR tool that automates your insurance selection. Let me know if you’d like to chat further – we’re doing this for SoldLead8 already.
BTW, congrats on your recent round!
Cheers!AK
Mass customization
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Sector-by-sector comparison through a lead list to find sold customers in their sector
From: [email protected]: [email protected]: Michael said you needed insurance?
Hi Sarah,
I saw you guys were hiring for HR. We know each other through Michael James and I wanted to see if we might be able to help you scale your HR practices. I have an HR tool that automates your insurance selection. Let me know if you’d like to chat further – we’re doing this for SoldLead8 already.
BTW, congrats on your recent round!
Cheers!AK
Mass customization
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Background Research
From: [email protected]: [email protected]: Michael said you needed insurance?
Hi Sarah,
I saw you guys were hiring for HR. We know each other through Michael James and I wanted to see if we might be able to help you scale your HR practices. I have an HR tool that automates your insurance selection. Let me know if you’d like to chat further – we’re doing this for SoldLead8 already.
BTW, congrats on your recent round!
Cheers!AK
Our basic unit of pitching
A 3-person team: • 1 virtual lead generation rep
• Researches new leads
• 1 outreach/writing staffer
• Sends emails
• 1 manager/QA staffer (!!!)
• Saves you time
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Putting it All Together
We gave prospectors: • LinkedIn Premium
• Email access in MailGenius
• Pitching on behalf of sales reps
inside organizations
We gave researchers: • LinkedIn Premium
• Google Spreadsheets
• Import.io
• Rapportive
• Toofr (verification)
• Datanyze or BuiltWith
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Sample results
One team of 3 like this can produce: • 30 verified leads per hour
• 1200 leads per week
• 1200 emails per week
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33 teams could produce: • 660 verified leads per hour
• 26400 leads per week
• 26400 emails per week
• ~1.5 million leads a year
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Results
3M companies were collected over 24 months.120K person-hours of research
Someone at your company probably got an email
that started with us.
Campaign low: 0.1% PRR
Campaign high: 30% PRR
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Results
3M companies were collected over 24 months.120K person-hours of research
Someone at your company probably got an email
that started with us.
Campaign low: 0.1% PRR
Campaign high: 30% PRR
Our customer picked up 2000 new clients in the first 12 months of prospecting.
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You can do this today using the sametools we used two years back, but…
by now LeadGenius (+ others) have built:
• crawlers + automated extraction tools
• automated verification tools
• tools to dump into CRMNo need to reinvent the wheel.
Takeaways
You can do things that don't scale when going
after SMB, if you use the right technology.
Sales can pitch small and midsize businesses
using the same tactics that work in marketing
(personalization at scale).
Use technology and data collection to make
your prospecting targeted and customized.
That’s it!• Tell me what’s working for
you:[email protected], @polybot
• If you want to use our software or data: www.leadgenius.com, @leadgenius
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What I’ll share with you tonight:
• Strategies we used to: — source hundreds of leads / week on the cheap, using either
software (free or paid) or virtual staffers (paid)— pitch and engage with 50-100 small and midsize customers per day, automatically and convincingly–– repeatably generate consistent sales from virtual outbound,
either solo or with a marketing team
1. Content marketing mash-up.
Share targeted content
aimed at your audience at
the same time as an email
campaign. (LinkedIn,
email). Ask marketing for
help.
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Blog Post
Dedicated Landing Page
Outbound
2. Scripting responses
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From: [email protected]: [email protected]
Subj: Quick Question, Sarah Hi Sarah,
I saw you guys were hiring for SDRs. We know each
other through Michael James and I wanted to see if we might be able to help you scale your SDR team. I have a few extra SDRs we
can push your way.
Let me know if you’d like to chat further – we’re doing this for SoldLead8 already.
BTW, congrats on your recent round!
Cheers! AK
Interested?Here’s 3 times that work for
me!
Here’s more information!
Check back later.
Specific question
Automatically schedule a
follow-up mail
3. Send before you hire.
• Reps ramp far faster when they have leads to close against.
• When you hire a sales rep, start sending emails for them!
• Let them walk into ready deal flow and live calls.
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4. Other outbound tips
• Mix it up! Authenticity is maximally important as email becomes an
increasingly crowded channel.
• Consider non-email channels (InMail) or asking for referrals from your
own network to penetrate into companies before contacting
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4. Other outbound tips
• Rank your leads.
• Don’t send outbound to EVERYBODY
• Message against buying signals.
• Start with folks with hot “buying signals”
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