You mentioned 'Automation' multiple times. There's no magic solution out there.
CRM system(any of the bigger names really) will do email automation,lead tracking, sales funnel,etc.
What's your product?
Is it an easy to use utility that doesn't cost much or is it huge enterprise software that'd require at least 5 rounds of lunches with CTOs before they even consider?
If it's former- invest in marketing, if it's latter- start thinking how you'll get in touch with leads,etc.
Don't try to automate everything,or you'll be just another one on LinkedIn who sends these standard,off the mill sales cadence messages with the hopes someone will pick it up.
> Don't try to automate everything,or you'll be just another one on LinkedIn who sends these standard,off the mill sales cadence messages with the hopes someone will pick it up.
This times 1000x. Don’t automate your sales. It’s a technical founder trap. Sales = people = genuine connections. Read their LinkedIn, try and find a connection / shared interest and craft a tailor made message. You’ll think this costs a lot of time, but it’s well worth it.
If anything study people / interaction dynamics. A good timeless book is “How To Make Friends and Influence People”.
With that you’ll quench your automation thirst when you realise that there _are_ psychological frameworks that you can utilise to “automate” your interactions and take away some of the magic and randomness.
I 75% agree :-) Sales (like public relations and many other things is mostly about relationships--at least unless it's basically a B2C numbers game but now we're more into marketing than sales). And it's probably more useful to default to that mindset than to assume that if you just have the right tech stack you'll never need to talk to anyone.
That said, you do probably want content marketing (e.g. a blog), emails, data of various sorts, etc. so it's not just about making personal connections--again depending upon the nature of the product.
Fair point, I mentioned automation probably because of my background. But honestly, I am asking more in general about tooling. To make an analogy, I could write code in Notepad or in Sublime Text / Vim. If I were to start coding today, I would like someone to point me in the Sublime Text direction.
Does that make sense? Is there anything similar for Sales in terms of recommended tooling?
What's your product?
Is it an easy to use utility that doesn't cost much or is it huge enterprise software that'd require at least 5 rounds of lunches with CTOs before they even consider?
If it's former- invest in marketing, if it's latter- start thinking how you'll get in touch with leads,etc.
Don't try to automate everything,or you'll be just another one on LinkedIn who sends these standard,off the mill sales cadence messages with the hopes someone will pick it up.