Tech Sales Readiness Checklist

Hiring a Growth and GTM person as an early-stage founder?  Give them this checklist and ask them to execute on this within 6 months. • Define the problem—no fluff, just brutal honesty. • Understand customer pain points in their language. • Craft a specific, measurable value proposition. • Compile case studies, even scrappy ones. • Define ICP by problem, company, industry, size, revenue, tech stack, job title, budget. • Use Sales Navigator & Apollo to map TAM. • Calculate total potential accounts & contacts. • Export, verify, segment, and add prospects to CRM. • Set up CRM with automations, integrations & workflows. • List key buying signals for outbound strategy. • Identify 20 industry influencers for shortcuts to market. • Research 10 competitors with audience & distribution. • Identify 10 complementary products & companies for partnerships. • Track engagement with influencers, competitors & thought leaders. • Monitor ICPs & customers for job changes & updates. • Implement website tracking for visitor behavior. • Source leads creatively (social, Google Maps, YC, job boards, VC  portfolios). • Establish a system to qualify, score, and route leads. • Develop materials to convert responses into meetings. • Build a follow-up system for ghosted & delayed prospects. • Test & refine messaging—analyze top-performing campaigns. • Build founder-led LinkedIn & Twitter presence (can't fully  outsource). • Implement ads (Meta, Google, newsletters) only after testing. • Develop video & newsletter strategy—consistency beats perfection. • Test offers & referral programs—make customers sell for you. • Update website copy as customer insights evolve. • Address no-shows & poor-fit prospects. • Optimize for retention, LTV, and scaling. ...Congrats! Now measure what's working well and repeat! You can also use joinvalley.co if your ICP is active on LinkedIn.

Summer is right around the corner. In technology procurement land its time for RFPs for replatform. As someone who's done this a fair few times, here's what I look for. 1. Thesis: Does the company have a thesis about why they want to replace the current platform? A simplistic "because its old" is not a great answer. Find their why. Build a hypothesis of what must be different in the business with the new platform for the buyer and the business. This will lead to the right business case. 2. Vendors: Typical RFPs ask about specific features or functions. There is a very limited cursory set of questions about the actual vendor. RFP is a great time to learn about the vendor in depth. Use this as an opportunity to learn about the business model, operating principles, ways of working and its competitors as well as its customers similar to the buying company. 3. Details: Don't ask for company revenue or years in business. What will the buyer learn about a vendor from those? That they have paying customers and have continually employed some people for a bunch of years? That's not valuable intel. Instead, ask about - Trailing 12-month and next-year's projected revenues. - Customers won in the past 12 months. - Customers that exited in the past 12 months. These bits of info will say more about the vendor health, both financially and as a viable product. If the vendor is a large, publicly traded company, ask for these metrics as it relates to the platform under consideration. Most such large and/or public companies operate internally as several business units, each with its own P&L. For larger vendors under consideration, its also useful to find out how many customers in your direct-competitor set are in their customer base. 4. Roadmap: This is the least interesting piece of information a buyer can ask for. A roadmap is nice slideware; I've seen or built my fair share of them. For the most part, not only are these roadmaps useless for the buyer's actual planning purposes, but they're also usually overstating what will actually be delivered. I ask that a future 12-month roadmap be paired with the past 12 months' actual features and capabilities that went GA. A smart buyer will put them side-by-side to understand whether the future will actually come to fruition. Unless a vendor has significantly increased their product team size in the past year, it is unlikely to deliver more net new features and capabilities into GA in the next year than in the past year. 5. References: Ask for references within your direct competitor set. One will be surprised how often companies talk to their peers in the same industry. Yet most tech buying explicitly turns away from references within the industry. When buying technology, it was helpful for me to talk to others that our business routinely was up against; it allowed us to quickly learn from our peers about fit, and pitfalls with any vendor they used. Good luck RFP teams!

Defense Tech Is Booming. But Are You Really Defense-Ready? Can a Startup or Scale-Up Succeed in the Defense Market? Are you making the right investments? The defense market is very hot for entrepreneurs, but it is not for the faint-hearted. Long procurement cycles, complex requirements, and a demanding end-user environment make it very different from the commercial tech world. Over the years, I’ve found that asking the right questions early helps identify whether a company truly has a viable defense solution, or whether it’s not a good fit. Here’s my list of questions I use to assess defense market readiness 👇 🔍 Problem & User Validation - Which specific problem is your solution solving? - Did you confirm the need and requirements with active military personnel? - Did you develop your solution using constant feedback loops with active military end users? - Did you test your solution in a real military environment under realistic operational conditions? 🔐 Security & Compliance - Do you and your team members hold the necessary security clearances? - Does your solution comply with military or NATO standards (e.g., MIL-STD, STANAG)? - Have you assessed export control implications (ITAR, EAR, EU dual-use regulations)? - How do you handle sensitive or classified data? ⚙️ Technology Readiness - What Technology Readiness Level (TRL) is your solution currently at? - Is your technology dual-use, or designed specifically for defense? - Have you conducted cybersecurity or resilience testing against defense-grade threats? - Can your solution integrate with existing defense systems or networks? 🧭 Operational Understanding - Do you understand the environment your solution will operate in (battlefield, naval, air, cyber, logistics)? - How does your solution reduce risk or improve mission effectiveness for defense users? - Can your product operate in austere or hostile environments? 💼 Business & Procurement Readiness - Are you familiar with defense acquisition processes and long sales cycles? - Do you have contacts with military procurement experts or primes? - Have you engaged with defense innovation programs (e.g., DIU, AFWERX, DASA, DIANA, EDF)? - Can you run proof of concepts or demos without initial payment? - Can your company survive at least a year without being paid? 🧠 Team & Strategy - Does your team include people with defense or security backgrounds? - Do you have advisors who understand defense procurement? - How will you scale production and support if adoption occurs? - Have you considered ethical or reputational risks of operating in defense? - What’s your long-term vision in the defense sector? ✅ If a startup can confidently answer most of these questions, they’re probably on the right track to becoming a trusted defense partner. Nobody said it was easy. It is a passion. It is a mission. This is M6. Close Down Net.

If you’re the only one who can sell your product, you don't have a startup. You have a high-stress freelance gig. Founder-led sales is necessary to find Product-Market Fit, but it is a death trap for scaling. To build a venture-scale business, you must extract the "magic" from your brain and put it into a repeatable process that a mid-level hire can execute. Here is the no-BS checklist to kill founder-dependency and make your revenue predictable: ➤ 1. Build the "Minimum Viable Playbook" If your sales process changes every time you get on a call, you don't have a process. → Document every objection you hear and the exact script that neutralizes it. → If you can't hand a PDF to a new hire and have them close a small deal in 30 days, your "magic" isn't documented yet. ➤ 2. Standardize Your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) Founder-dependent revenue usually comes from "bespoke" selling...chasing anyone with a checkbook. → Scalable revenue comes from saying No to anyone who doesn't fit your narrow ICP. → Define the exact title, industry, and pain point you solve. If the lead is outside this box, don't take the call. ➤ 3. Kill the Technical Jargon Founders love to talk about "features." Salespeople need to talk about "outcomes." → If your pitch requires a PhD or 5 years of context to understand, no salesperson will ever be able to replicate it. → Simplify your value proposition until a 10-year-old can explain it. ➤ 4. Hire Two AEs, Not a "VP of Sales" A common mistake is hiring a high-priced VP to "build the department." → You don't need a manager; you need doers. Hire two Account Executives (AEs) simultaneously. → Two hires create a benchmark. If one fails and the other succeeds, you know the process works. If both fail, your playbook is the problem. ➤ 5. CRM Discipline is Non-Negotiable If it isn't in the CRM, it didn't happen. → Founders often run deals out of their inbox or "intuition." This is how leads die. → Every stage of the funnel must have a clear "Entry" and "Exit" criteria that anyone can audit. ➤ 6. The "Founder-Off" Test The ultimate test of scalability is removing yourself from the closing call. → Start by joining calls only as a "Technical Observer" while your AE leads. → Then, stop joining the calls entirely. If your win rate drops by more than 20%, your product is still too dependent on your personal "vision" rather than its own value. Stop being the hero. Start being the architect. --- Want brutal clarity on your startup? Skip years of wasted effort and stop making expensive mistakes. Get direct advice on your deck, fundraising, GTM, or founder challenges. Book a no-BS 1:1 call with me here: https://lnkd.in/gWV8DT56 💬 Drop your most burning question in the comments. ♻ Repost to help a founder stop being a bottleneck. 🔔 Follow Anshuman Sinha for more Startup insights. #Startups #Entrepreneurship #Management #VentureCapital #Marketing

Yesterday, Grant Jones (our head of sales) asked me a great question: “If you were thinking about buying a $1,000/month tool at Arrows, what would your actual process be to make that decision?” It was a really cool exercise actually. His goal was to help shape our own sales process around the real steps buyers go through to say yes. And there’s no reason to gatekeep, so here’s what my process would generally look like: 1. Research competitors. I’ll always get a sense of what else is out there and compare price points. If I’m already familiar with the space, I might not do any other demos, but I’ll still scan the landscape for anything compelling. 2. Book a demo and/or start a trial. Ideally both. I like to try the product before the call so I can come in with specific questions. 3. Write up a pitch for the team. If I think it’s worth pursuing, I’ll share it internally to see who else has opinions or use cases. If anyone else on the team has specific questions, I’ll schedule a follow-up call with the vendor. 4. Assess bandwidth. Do we realistically have the time and focus to implement this? I want to have a clear view of what rollout would look like. 5. Check for flexible billing. If we can start month-to-month, we’re much more likely to give it a shot. 6. Buy it. If it passes the above checks, and especially if I can test it hands-on, I’ll pull the trigger. Important note: if there’s no trial or way to test it before buying, it’s a much harder sell for me. We’re a 10-person team, lean on tools, but quick to invest in things that help us move faster or work better. That said, we still need a compelling pitch and a clear path to value. Hope this helps others thinking through how to align their sales process with how buyers actually buy. 💘

AI agents are coming to sales whether you're ready or not. The difference between those who thrive and those who struggle? It's not the technology—it's the preparation. I've been deploying AI agents with sales teams, and here's what separates the winners from the chaos: 𝗔𝗜 𝗔𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝘃𝘀. 𝗔𝗜 𝗧𝗼𝗼𝗹𝘀: 𝗞𝗻𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗗𝗶𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 Your ChatGPT helps write emails faster. That's a tool. An AI agent qualifies 500 prospects while you sleep. That's transformation. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝟱 𝗧𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗦𝗮𝗹𝗲𝘀 𝗧𝗲𝗮𝗺 𝗠𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗙𝗶𝘅 𝗡𝗢𝗪: 𝟭. 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗖𝗥𝗠 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗮 𝗶𝘀 𝗮 𝗠𝗲𝘀𝘀 AI agents can't navigate your "Stage 3 (maybe 4?)" deals and duplicate accounts. Quick fix: • Audit your pipeline stages this week • Standardize opportunity data fields • Clean up duplicate accounts • Make "required fields" actually required 𝟮. 𝗦𝗵𝗮𝗱𝗼𝘄 𝗔𝗜 𝗶𝘀 𝗔𝗹𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝘆 𝗛𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗲𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 Your reps are using random AI tools. You just don't know it. Quick fix: • Survey what AI your team uses TODAY • Create approved AI tool list • Set clear usage guidelines • Build secure AI workspaces 𝟯. 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗦𝗮𝗹𝗲𝘀 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗜𝘀𝗻'𝘁 𝗔𝗜-𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗱𝘆 AI agents need clear workflows. Your "it depends" process won't cut it. Map these workflows NOW: • Lead qualification criteria • Deal stage exit criteria • Handoff processes between SDR/AE • Follow-up sequences and timing 𝟰. 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗧𝗲𝗰𝗵 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗶𝘀 𝗛𝗲𝗹𝗱 𝗧𝗼𝗴𝗲𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗗𝘂𝗰𝘁 𝗧𝗮𝗽𝗲 That manual export from Tool A to import into Tool B? AI agents can't do that. Audit your integration gaps: • CRM ↔ Sales engagement platform • Meeting scheduler ↔ Calendar • Email ↔ Activity tracking • Data enrichment ↔ Lead routing 𝟱. 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗢𝗡𝗘 𝗨𝘀𝗲 𝗖𝗮𝘀𝗲 • Stalled deals? Deploy a Deal Intelligence Agent • Poor lead quality? Build a Qualification Agent • Slow follow-up? Create a Response Agent 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗔𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗣𝗹𝗮𝗻: 1. Clean up your CRM data (start with stages and required fields) 2. Survey your team: "What AI tools did you use this week?" 3. Document your actual sales process (not the ideal one) 4. List your broken integrations 5. Choose ONE AI agent use case to pilot The companies succeeding with AI agents aren't the ones with the biggest budgets. They're the ones who prepared their foundation first. Your competition is already building their AI sales army. What's your first move?

If you’re targeting remote Sales roles (Account Executive / Inside Sales / SDR / Sales Engineering), here is everything you need: Companies hiring right now (Remote / Global-first): SugarCRM Xenon Seven OneDirect Sparteo Ocrolus The Collective Ace Group Ripple junction Alpaca Grafana Labs FRESHPRINT Wiz Ivanti Neo4j Oliv. ai ADVATIX - APAC ElevenLabs Circle Social Inc. BrowserStack Continental -------------------------- Tools to create a sales-focused resume and portfolio: Resume: Mera Career Portfolio (Yes, even sales should have one): Notion – Deal stories, pipeline breakdowns, win strategy Webflow – Personal sales profile Canva – Sales brag deck (quota, ARR, ACV proof) HubSpot – Showcase pipeline & CRM screenshots (if permitted) (Tip: Remote sales hiring screens heavily for numbers - quota %, ARR, ACV, win rate, sales cycle reduction. Metrics > adjectives.) -------------------------- Prepare for Sales interviews (Mock & practice tools): Final Round AI My Interview Practice Soreno AI (Best for actual sales simulations) PracticeInterview AI IGotAnOffer [for paid 1:1 mock interviews] -------------------------- Top YouTube channels to subscribe to Tech Sales With Higher Levels Patrick Dang 30 Minutes to President’s Club The Brutal Truth About Sales SaaStr -------------------------- Newsletters every Sales professional should read The GTM Newsletter Sales Hacker RevGenius Lenny's Newsletter (strong for enterprise/GTM context) -------------------------- Certifications that actually help (signal > logo) Winning by Design – SaaS Sales Mastery HubSpot Academy – Inbound Sales Certification Gartner – Challenger / Enterprise selling programs Salesforce – Salesforce Sales Cloud Certification Pavilion – Revenue leadership tracks (Yes, paid. Yes, respected. Especially for enterprise / SaaS sales.) -------------------------- Mentorship (High-touch, small cohort): I’m starting a close-group, high-touch mentorship cohort from the 1st week of March, focused purely on: - Positioning - Mindset - Resume + LinkedIn - Interview strategy - 1:1 + Group coaching If this is something you’re looking for, send me a connect request with the message: “Mentorship.” I’ll share more details personally. #JobSearch #SalesCareers #AccountExecutive #RemoteJobs #WFH

Sales has changed in 2025. Now it's not about having more tools, it's about having a clear path. Because a messy stack won’t save a broken motion. Trust me, you don’t need everything, you need the right tech map that guides each step from prospect to closed-won. Here’s what that looks like 👇 1️⃣ B2B Database → Apollo: Massive contact database with integrated outreach. → Salesforce Navigator: Advanced LinkedIn search for pinpoint targeting. → Crunchbase: Track funding rounds and fast-growing companies. 2️⃣ Email Finder → Findymail: Clean, verified emails with strong deliverability. → FullEnrich: Adds missing data like role, location, tech stack. → Prospeo.io: B2B contact finder with bulk search features. 3️⃣ Intent Signals → Trigify.io: Tracks buyer signals from job posts, hiring, and growth. → BuiltWith: Reveals what tech a company uses on its site. → LoneScale: Monitors company changes, triggers, and buying intent. 4️⃣ Sales Engagement → Reply: Multichannel sequences + AI SDR for personalization. → Outreach: Enterprise-grade sequences and analytics. → Salesloft: Structured workflows and pipeline insights. 5️⃣ Automation → Zapier: Connects apps to automate repetitive tasks. → n8n: Open-source automation for advanced workflows. → Make: Visual builder for complex automations without code. 6️⃣ Sales Productivity → Rattle: Real-time alerts from Salesforce to Slack. → WINN.AI: Keeps reps focused with daily goals + AI coaching. → Attention: AI assistant that automates call notes and insights. 7️⃣ Team Communication → Notion: All-in-one workspace for notes, wikis, and docs. → Slack: Fast team messaging and async collaboration. → ClickUp: Project management with CRM-style views. 8️⃣ Sales Training → Nooks: Virtual sales floor for live coaching + call analytics. → Hyperbound: AI-powered training paths for SDRs. → Orum 🥇: Parallel dialer that helps reps crush cold calls. 9️⃣ Copywriting → Claude by Anthropic: Conversational AI that helps with thoughtful writing. → Jasper Tech Ai: AI writer for email, landing pages, and more. → Twain: Edits your sales copy to sound clearer and convert better. _______________________________ Don’t just stack tools, but map your motion. Save this post, share it with your team, and start building a stack that actually sells 💅

Just landed your first automation agency sales call? Great. Here's my 7-step checklist for nailing that call and closing the deal: 1. Skip the hard sell. Your job is to consult and understand. 2. Ask these key questions: • "What made you want to [book this call/post on Upwork/respond to my email]?" • "How long has this problem been going on?" • "When do you need it fixed?" • "Do you have a budget in mind?" 3. Listen more than you talk. Let them reveal their pain points. 4. Provide a high-level solution: "Here's how I would fix it: [brief explanation]" 5. Confirm fit: "Given everything you've told me, this makes sense and I can help." 6. Set next steps: "I'll send you a proposal with more details." 7. Offer a follow-up: "We can set up another call to walk through it if needed." Remember: You're not selling automation. You're selling peace of mind and efficiency. This framework has helped me close a lot of clients. Use it, tweak it, make it your own. Most importantly: Practice. Every call makes you better.

A typical Mid-Market seller might manage 50 different opportunities at any given time. An SMB seller might have to manage 70. For each account, she has to track 9+ different notifications, news alerts, enablement tips, and insights for every account they manage. (Here’s the full list) 1. Unique point of view on the market Teach the prospect something differentiated and new. Commercial teaching à la Challenger. Some kind of market driven insights. 2. Competitor insights Know the features, know the positioning, know how we’re different. 3. Relevant case studies How does our solution apply to this person, this industry, this very specific use case which is subtly different from all the others. 4. Updated account plans Who’s above the power line, who has a preference for solution, who doesn’t like us but doesn’t matter. The orientation and next steps for every relevant person across 20+ relationships per account. 5. MEDDPICC documentation Down the extensive checklist and cross-referenced against our champion plus all the other stakeholders. See above. 6. Funding updates Did they just raise? Divest? Get acquired? Better show up with in-depth knowledge about all of that. 7. Job change alerts Open headcount. Shifts in new positions. Reallocated headcount budget. 8. Content engagement tracking They read the white paper (or didn’t). They subscribed or unsubscribed from our newsletter. Just how interested are they? 9. Field marketing data They just attended one of our prospect dinners in Austin. But was it the right person? How did it go? Check in with the event manager to make sure we made a good impression. Manage and track all of that information. Manually. Consistently. All updated. All correct. In time for accurate forecasting and commit meetings. It’s a lot. I’ve been building and managing revenue organizations for 20 years. It’s always been hard and its only getting harder. SOLUTION We’re moving from a world of “work harder” to a world of “work smarter” Companies and sales leaders are now leveraging AI in production where it can make a difference. Updates the data. Fills in the empty fields. Coaches and levels up. Nudges and reminds when appropriate.  AI that actually does the work.  That's why ZoomInfo just launched ZoomInfo Copilot Workspace. It gives sellers: - Complete buyer context - Automated research - One workspace where execution happens Not another dashboard or pane of glass. An actual execution layer that does the work. Great teams bridge the execution gap. The execution gap that separates winning teams from losing teams lies in simplifying the job of the seller so they can spend more time doing what we want them to do: talking to prospects and closing deals. That’s where we need them.