GTM 29: Capitalizing on Customer Stories with Dave Kennett

The GTM Podcast

Dave Kennett joins us on this week's episode to discuss lessons learned throughout his years transforming businesses to adapt for a digital world, the art form of sales, how to lead from the front, and walks us through the genesis and evolution of Replayz.

In 2019, after an extensive career at notable companies such as AutoTrader.ca, Strutta, Payfirma, Hootesuite, and MergeBase, Dave founded Replayz - a predictive SaaS platform that uses Data Science to analyze Call Scoring Results to predict what skills matter the most.

What You Will Learn:

• The importance of role-playing, how to communicate to the CFO
• Steps to building trust and rapport through credibility
• How to cultivate and leverage customer stories for a competitive advantage
• 5 leadership tools to arm your team with
• Ways to visibility improve your win rate
• How to lead from the front, and learn the most from past mistakes
• Strategies to navigate career path options in the current environment

Highlights:

(5:20) Call coaching culture & Replayz pain point solution strategy

(7:45) Blind spots in discovery/demos & how to avoid them

(13:22) Common threads of sales reps that consistently crush it

(18:10) How to introduce a customer story

(21:45) The importance of role-playing

(25:00) Digitally transforming AutoTrader to Trader.ca

(27:10) Leadership lessons from experience

(34:25) How to think about career pathing

(39:10) Rounding out your leadership skills

(40:25) Widely held beliefs that are wrong

(44:30) Actionable moves available now

Quotes:

“If you’re able to create consensus, and build bridges, in an unofficial leadership capacity where you can’t just tell someone to do something and they do it, you’re going to build a lot of muscles that will be very applicable in the real world.”

“Really understanding what are the things keeping up your prospect up at night, costing them either inefficiency or money, and where can you help them. That mental shift is what we see really helps reps. Spend more time on discovery - and then it’s not just spending the time, it’s what you spend the time on”

“All we need to do is think what it’s like being in a buying position ourselves; we’ve all been there. When you really think that through, on what kind of experience you want as part of the buyer journey, it’s pretty easy to start adapting your style that way.”

“If I’m asking for someones time I should at least do the research to create a hypothesis that might resonate with them - lead them to where you think they might be going.”

“We should, as sales professionals, aspire to leave the prospect after every single call with a feeling like ‘Wow that sales rep taught me so much that I would have actually paid for that call.’"

“Someone told me, ‘You’re a nice guy and sometimes too nice. Go in as the hard-ass, you can always come back and ring that in later.’ I took that advice, and it was terrible advice, because it wasn’t who I genuinely was. That caused a disconnect between the leader I could’ve been versus the leader I was.”

Links and Resources

Dave’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dkennett/

Replayz Website: https://replayz.com/

The GTM Podcast

Don’t miss The .GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world.

And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

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