Burn The Playbook

Sales Without the Script | Petra Wagner on GTM, AI, and Getting Into the Buyer's Shoes

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Mastering B2B Sales with Petra Wagner: From Enterprise Exec to AI Coach

Join Marc Crosby and guest Petra Wagner, a B2B sales strategist with over 20 years of experience at Microsoft and IBM. Petra shares invaluable insights from her journey, including the challenges of transitioning from enterprise sales to helping startups achieve consistent revenue. Learn about the importance of personalized sales approaches, leveraging AI tools like her Petra AI, and essential sales training techniques. Gain expert advice on navigating price objections, stakeholder mapping, and the evolving role of AI in sales. Tune in for actionable tips on building a robust sales process and enhancing your sales strategy with real-world applications.

Petra Wagner is a B2B sales strategist and the author of the SalesBooster Framework — a no-fluff system that helps founders with zero sales experience land their first customers and build repeatable revenue. With over 20 years of experience leading B2B sales at Microsoft and IBM, and later working as a C-level executive and tech buyer in a traditional enterprise, Petra brings a rare dual perspective: she knows how to sell — and how buying decisions are really made.

 

She created SalesBooster to help early-stage founders build a sales engine they actually enjoy running — one that blends startup grit with enterprise strategy, and works even without a sales background. Through her free Petra AI Sales coach and her premium Traction Toolkit, Petra equips founders with the mindset, structure, and tools to go from pitch to close with confidence — and without the pressure of traditional sales tactics.

 

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Petra SalesBooster web page

Traction Tool Kit

 

00:00 Introduction to Burn The Playbook
01:09 Rapid Fire Facts About Slovenia
02:53 Petra's Journey from Enterprise to Helping Founders
04:27 Challenges in Enterprise Sales Processes
05:28 The Importance of Sales Training
07:10 Adapting Sales Training for Experience Levels
09:14 Insights from a Buyer’s Perspective

Views expressed are our own and do not represent any organizations

© 2025 Digital Rebels Consulting. All rights reserved.


SPEAKER_00:

Every B2B podcast sounds the same. Cookie cutter strategies, corporate buzzwords, high level theory that sounds smart but changes nothing. Meanwhile, the real game changes are out there breaking every rule in the playbook and crushing it. They're not following best practices. They're building their own path and winning in the ways that experts said wouldn't work. These are the rebels you need to hear from. The ones with tactics you can actually use tomorrow. This is Burn the Playbook. Burn everything that's holding you back. I'm Mark Crosby and this is Burn the Playbook. I'm honored to have Petra Wagner as our guest today. Petra is a B2B sales strategist and author of the Sales Booster Framework, a sales system helping founders go from great product, no traction, to consistent revenue. With 20 plus years leading sales at Microsoft and IBM and later buying tech as a C-level exec in a traditional enterprise, Petra brings the rare perspective of both the buyer and the seller, which I love about you. She now helps founders sell smarter with her AI coach Petra AI and her paid attraction toolkit welcome Petra

SPEAKER_02:

hello nice to meet you

SPEAKER_00:

all right before we start out today and hearing your journey from enterprise to how you're helping founders today I wanted to do a quick rapid fire about Slovenia because that's where you're from and that's where you're calling from today so I'm going to give you a few rapid fire interesting tidbits of information that I found about Slovenia so I heard that bees are a big deal in Slovenia true or True. And why is that?

SPEAKER_02:

You know, it's, it's historical. So basically they produce something and they are very valuable for us. So it's, it's a craft here and it's a really healthy, healthy stuff. So yeah, we believe it's valuable.

SPEAKER_00:

Gotcha. I imagine the best honey probably comes from Slovenia. Exactly. Not just

SPEAKER_02:

honey, but also the products from the honey, like, you know, for the skin and everything.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Awesome. Very cool. Also found out that the best skiers are from Slovenia, true or false?

SPEAKER_02:

Skiers. Maybe they were.

SPEAKER_00:

Skiers.

SPEAKER_02:

Skiers, they were. Maybe. Yeah, they were.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. Not today? Today

SPEAKER_02:

we have Luka Doncic, today Pivacar, Primož Roglic, you know, guys. But we have skiers as well, yeah, of course.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. So false. Not skiing. Maybe basketball. Okay. This one was interesting. Tap water is so good you can drink it from the public fountains.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes. Everywhere you can drink it normally, yeah. It's

SPEAKER_00:

interesting okay all right any other fun facts that i missed

SPEAKER_02:

yeah we are two million country and we have love in the name so slovenia is written with love um so yeah we have mountains to ski and we have seaside so everything packed in two million people

SPEAKER_00:

awesome hopefully i can make it there one day all right good stuff and thank you for the information so how did you get started in sales you worked for microsoft and ibm so how did you start from enterprise to where you are today as far as helping founders?

SPEAKER_02:

So basically, I started as a student in IBM. As a coincidence, I was searching for a job being a competitive Latin American and ballroom dancer. And after my college degree, I somehow decided to start working and we have like student work. So I started at IBM, continued there for, let's say, eight years, and then moved to Microsoft, having different roles from, you sales lead roles, regional and of course national. And then I moved after 18 years of that. I felt that I have to empower any traditional company in Slovenia. So with the knowledge that I gained from the corporation for the markets, from the team, from leadership and everything, that I can have traditional company in the country to grow, to modernize, to transform. So I went to Slovenian traditional company. I've been there year and a half, something like that, starting digital transformation and sales transformation of the company. And then I moved to on my own. So basically I'm now more than two years on my own, helping startups and tech companies with sales, a little bit of leadership, but mainly help them unpack, which seems to be complex, but in reality, it's not so complex, but it's work.

SPEAKER_00:

Gotcha. What is it about enterprises and their sales process that make it complex or just bad habits that they can't seem to break?

SPEAKER_02:

I mean, basically, enterprises are big companies with complex processes. They have to follow some rules, but usually it's more about the process than the outcome. So they all focus on the methodologies, the processes, of course, the compliance, it has to be there. They also teach people on that, so upskilling people on that. And then the outcome is And in our case, if we talk about sales, the buyer is a second thought. So yeah, this is something, you know, we can take in portion to startups, but not full. And this is rigid for the enterprise. Yeah. So there are big ships. They move slow.

SPEAKER_00:

It is, they move slow. And I think in a lot of cases, you know, enterprise companies, some provide training, some don't provide training. What do you find as far as just the training processes of when you're onboarding somebody that just doesn't work, you know, as far as either my Microsoft, IBM, or even the companies that you work with today, like what's broken as far as the sales training process?

SPEAKER_02:

I mean, I have to say that I love IBM sales training school. So IBM Global Sales School, I've done it in 2006 and 2007, and it helped me a lot through career. It was meant, and I still believe probably it is, it gives you proper onboarding. It's not about product, let's say, shit leads and only features and functions. It's about how to present value, how to understand the value, how to handle the objections, and really try to understand the business processes, the business metrics, the goals of the customer. I guess during the work, so during seven, eight years, you receive less and less debt. There are some peaks when you receive it again, but it depends from the results points of view and so on. But what I see in others, let's say big companies, and I is exactly that. Yeah, they prefer product sheetlets, features, functions, and everything about the product, which needs to be there. And they care less about the value for who is it, which problems we are solving, you know, everything what we teach also startups for. So they are all in love in their product, which is fine. But, you know, what is in it for me as a buyer? So this is what I miss also in big companies in sales training. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

So for sales training, I think most maybe leaders or even companies think that, you know, once you start a job in sales, that's when you receive sales training. And maybe occasionally after that, you receive some subsequent sales training. So should the training be the same for somebody who's in year one as a person who's in year 20? I mean, I think these days, you know, the markets are changing, training's changing, AI is complicating at least a lot of the sales-led processes. So do we train everybody the same or is the process a little bit different for for anybody based on experience what's your what's your

SPEAKER_02:

approach yeah you punched me it's not about you know we shouldn't say experience is relevance yeah so it maybe it was like that in 2012 yeah that people with experience um had some some advantage but right now it's really about relevance and as you said you know there are some ai tools there are some new approaches there are buyers who are more empowered more knowledgeable they know much more about us and yeah I see this when when I teach when I coach people actually I was coaching IBMers in previous November the guys and the ladies who are there for 30 years 20 years yeah done this school that I was mentioning before but somehow There is some negative connotation about the tools and the noise around it because it is the noise. But I still think that the relevance because of the buyer is there. So if me as experienced seller, I still need to learn. I still need to get and understand the tools to cut through the noise so I can be relevant for the buyer because otherwise they don't need me. They have everything on the internet.

SPEAKER_00:

Exactly. And it's constantly evolving. And I think that it doesn't matter if you have five years experience or 50 years experience you got to keep up with the times constantly evolve continuous improvement keep up with what's changing or else you might get left behind

SPEAKER_02:

and why is

SPEAKER_00:

that

SPEAKER_02:

because the buyer yeah the buyer is changing that's why yeah it's not about us being obsolete it's about how we as buyers are changing so let's accommodate to the one we are serving yeah let's serve them properly

SPEAKER_00:

exactly and you were a buyer before so I would love to hear because I love the experience of having you know both sides of the table you know in a prior role that I had I was on one side of the table then I moved to the other and it was tremendously helpful just to understand the big picture and the holistic view of how we can help each other so you know if you've been on the buyer side and now you're helping sellers what's you know what's one thing that you know buyers could tell sellers to stop doing today that they just constantly do and then whether it's you know selling to them selling features and benefits like what's an approach that as a a buyer, you would like sellers to do something differently. Stop doing.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. I was shocked when I was a buyer. It's hard to buy. It's really hard to buy. Although I came from being trained as a seller how to sell. But then after 18 years, I went on the other side and I thought, oh, it's so easy to be buyer. I already somehow know what I need to buy. So I will just choose the best option and they will present me. They will find my needs. They will connect. everything. And, you know, of course, we have the procurement, everything is set. So, yeah, it's simple. Yeah. And I know what decision making processes in the company and so on and so forth. But in reality, it's far from that. Basically, the first thing was that I was shocked about the sellers, of course, because, you know, I think I know how to sell, at least I thought before. And when they come to me, they was like really presenting features and functions and they were presenting me like I know everything. I don't, you know, I have to fire, hire, discuss with my boss. I have so many other things on my plate and they have like, I don't know, 15 minutes with me or one hour with me and they think I really know everything. So these assumptions are really bad. So they go straight to features and functions and they give me, they gave me every, every, every time they gave me generic pitch, you know? So yeah, it is like generic to say that, but when you come to I don't know, I was in publishing and retail and they come and present me how insurance works. It's the same HR solution or the same logistics solutions or whatever, but it works differently. So take time, ask questions, attach them to your solution, make case for me. That's one thing. It's really features and functions. Then the other thing, when I was a buyer and surprised me and I had a role to make decision. So it's not so easy. Because as you know, and I heard and I read your LinkedIn and everything, so there are between 11 and 16 decision makers. It's not one with the budget or the one above. There is really going internal politics around who will take the budget, which project will be priority, how we should make it happen. And also, if I have this project, what's the next project that I will have? So how these projects connect with each other, of course, and then the procurement and compliance and everything but also from internal politics it's hard work you know you cannot just say okay i will decide that and people below you or people reporting to you will just say yes they work there for a long time they have their experience they will work with that text so you better listen to them to certain extent or you know find consensus you know we know this about consensus buying and this is what sellers also need to consider It's not in my case, this IT guy and then the procurement maybe, but the consensus because people now will not make decisions because we fear of, you know, failure or messing up or whatever. And this is really becoming strong in traditional. You asked me before about enterprise companies. This is strong factor. So this consensus buying. And in case of sellers, do your stakeholder mapping, understand who are champions. This is not just theory, you know, the map pick and the stake stakeholder mapping and those stuff. This is real. And this is also a shock for me, or at least eye-opening, how this works in reality from the other side. So when I teach, when I work with sellers right now, let's do the stakeholder mapping. Let's understand fears, hopes, desires of each persona there, the little one, the middle one, the whatever, yeah? How they interact, who are blockers, who are mobilizers. Again, I'm going into the customer challenger theory, but it's so real, you know? You have to them somehow. And this is also the stuff that I would recommend to sellers. Do your homework. It's not one decision maker that you will find out and the magic will happen.

SPEAKER_00:

No, there is no magic wand. I think that in sales, a lot of people out there, they probably sell the magic wand, but you have to understand that it's not about just a straight line from discovery to close and there's some sort of articulate way that you need to close and some sort of magic extroverted you know, answer, you know, to get somebody to say yes, but it's very complicated. And I think that most of us know that I think, and tell me if I'm right or wrong. So a lot of the cases when I ever developed like a pitch deck, you know, for a buyer, I didn't develop it for the buyer. I developed it for the entire organization based on who I thought that they were going to present that pitch deck to after I left the room. So I had slides in there for the CFO. I might have slides in there for supply chain. I might have slides for, you know, the, you know, procurements boss or whoever else might be involved in the decision making process. So was that a good approach? And should others have that similar approach as far as, you know, talk about the features and the benefits at some point, but also understand what's in it for everybody else in that decision making process?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I mean, that's right. Yeah, you have to make this double sell, because, you know, we were trained how to sell. But these decision makers were never, unless they come from such environment, but they were never trained how to sell. Yeah. So we have to help them sell. And there is where come the connection let's say i'm i'm mainly talking you know to it guys or to cyber security guys or or ladies or and to procurement and so on you know and those guys were never trained to to to sell so they need to connect their strategy like the company strategies is let's say customer experience so they have to improve the customer experience what does it mean for it guy you know if they have some central storage let's say they and they need to connect it to customer or experience. unless they are trained or you ask them as a seller, they just need new storage because the previous one is old. It can fail. You know, he will have a lot of problems and so on and so forth. But if you connect the dots and say, look, guy, but your central POC system will not work or something like that. And these will have a customer experience issues. And of course, the financial impacts and so on. We can connect that. Of course, you have to take care how you discuss that not to go about them and so on. you know, with the empathy, with the questions and so forth. But yeah, that's back to your point. We have to help them sell internally. I call it like a double sell. So you as a seller can sell and then have them do the internal sell to the whoever is the decision makers and whatever KPIs they have. Legal have one, HR has the others, procurement. And of course, the board members have some others as well. Yeah. So let's connect the dots on that pitch deck.

SPEAKER_00:

Exactly. And you have to do the same on your side too. I presume that you're referring to maybe something that I wrote recently as far as just doing the same process on the seller side as you do on the buying side. So it's double work and you have to understand that everybody has to sign off on it at some point along the way. And speaking of that, I guess, what happens when you find somebody that's not willing to sign off on it? And what if that person is maybe not obvious on your decision-making map? How do you, I guess, prepare for that? Or what sort of, I guess, tactics would you advise people to either find that person or overcome that obstacle or prevent that from happening by maybe doing more homework up front

SPEAKER_02:

yeah of course i always suggest more homework pre-work before we go there ask whoever you want to search internet you know scrap whatever just to do your pretty work before also ask the tools like perplexity chat gpt whatever they know about you because buyers done this homework already mainly yeah 80 of them but in in in terms of blockers yeah once are blockers that you know and they hate your solution or from whatever reason advice let them go yeah let's think about others but if there are some people that you don't you didn't identify yet and they are not in the room let's start with basic questions so dear customer let's say that we agree now that this will solve this and this problem for you in such amount of time and you'll have such an impact who else will need to confirm that or who else need to see that or who else will have an opinion on that on on which people this solution will impact if you implemented it you know it's like if there are some it solutions and there is cyber security guys and they are not in the room probably you know they will say no it is cyber security risk and you will have to identify that the same goes with compliance risk with gdprs in europe and so on so ask questions who else beside you is impacted and should should understand or I should get the feedback from. So we can work together and help you go from point A to point B.

SPEAKER_00:

Gotcha. And I think that it's probably a possibility as why some deals get stuck because you probably don't ask those questions at the very beginning as far as asking your procurement person, your buyer or whoever you initiate contact with in the beginning, understanding maybe what that process looks like a little bit clearer in the beginning as opposed to further that you get down the line. Because I think when you get down the line and maybe internally on their side, they already have some opinions that are being formed. And by that time, it's probably too late to start changing the minds of your objectors or people that are not on board with your product or solution or maybe your company. So just my own opinion, I think you got to start that process very early in the beginning and probably find out who those potential detractors might be before you even open up the conversation to start talking about your business and asking those questions. I don't know. That's the approach that I've had some times as far as just getting as much knowledge as i can ahead of time you know before i go down that path because it might be too late to you know try to fix things down the road

SPEAKER_02:

on the way and offend people on the

SPEAKER_00:

way

SPEAKER_02:

with your boss

SPEAKER_00:

exactly exactly i think you know down the way at least in some commodity markets and some of the markets that i've served before you get stuck on price and maybe you found the same thing too and some of the enterprise deals or even founder-led deals that you know you help salespeople you know overcome so how do you overcome price objections and do you address price early in the process and just tell them what it is up front or do you wait and tell them later but what do you do when you get stuck on a price objection

SPEAKER_02:

I didn't sell value right if I come to the price objection yeah I mean it's a generic answer yeah we have to sell the value so if there is no value nobody will pay anything but you know with price objection is like that if this is the little price at the end in negotiation there are negotiation techniques and that's fine but if we come to the price objections probably they didn't see value along the way so of course what I see mainly it's not a holistic price challenge but what I see with startups is that they forget because they are learning on the way that there are some other pricing issues they didn't consider so either their sales solution and they need some I don't know some hardware behind or some cloud services for this to work or some device which they didn't ask if the customer has or, I don't know, some integration that is needed and they think it will just work, you know, in enterprise companies. I'm exaggerating a little bit. But in every case, there is a real life experience where something in the ecosystem needs, brings additional costs. Yeah. And this is something that then disturbs the customer because I budget something and then along the way you come that, oh, you need to buy, you know, this and these subscriptions along the way in order for this to work. So I think this is the main problem that I see. The price per set, it's handled during the value discussion, and then it's just the negotiation based on culture that we see and based on the procurement process, which is different in different parts of the world. But yeah, I would go the basic value discussion up front.

SPEAKER_00:

Gotcha. Easier said than done. I think you just have to think about these things along the way. I mean, it's just a bad habit, I think, that most people get into as far as just selling the features and the benefits and not selling the value along the way. And whether that's your organization or support services or e-commerce solutions, supply chain, you have to kind of bring in the big picture as far as what you can deliver as far as your solution. But I think that's where a lot of people get stuck on price.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, but you know, again, they are stuck on price because they didn't unpack what value does it bring to this person, to his KPI, to his or her business. You know, it's really, it was not unpacked. because they were so eager to present features and functions of their baby. And they didn't ask, so they didn't get answers. And they didn't really connect because, you know, if you are buying something, you always imagine how do you buy, you know? We are all emotional buyers, also in B2B. So if I will really achieve something with that, I will work on that hard in order to, you know, to make this project happen. So I am a mobilizer. So you have to identify if, you know, what is in it for me. and I will be your mobilizer.

SPEAKER_00:

Gotcha. Let's talk a little bit about AI and sales. Obviously, it's a hot topic that everyone wants to talk about these days. And you took the initiative to develop your own AI tool and Petra AI. So excited to unpack that a little bit here about how you came to the conclusion that, you know, Petra AI was going to help others. And, you know, maybe Petra AI can also help me with my, you know, when I get stuck on price. Could that help me there?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I mean, of course it can, you know, it will coach you. basically this is you know it's not some fancy schmancy AI tool you know like startups are doing it's really having me in your pocket yeah so I work with sellers with startup sellers who and people who never been sellers yeah never trained to sell so you know it's something like sales is a craft yeah so you have to work on it you have to train it nobody was born seller yeah maybe some for somebody is easier but they There are some basic principles and you have to train them like in any sports. Yeah, we started with skiers, so they have to train. And I was thinking about how I can clone myself. So how I can help more startup founders with some basic guidance questions that I see come along. So when I was doing sales booster framework, there are three phases, nine steps, very simple for each startup, you know, because there is a mess. They are doing ad hoc, they are running, you know, from marketing agency to pitching to investors and so on. So I gave them the basic framework that works. And for that basic frameworks, they have to get some answers. So go out, how to talk to customers, how to talk about your value propositions, how to define ideal customer, why somebody is ideal customer, also how to handle objections, how to qualify properly, you know, all these things that we've been doing for 20 years I packed into Petra AI I trained her so I really have this tough conversation with her and people are helping me on that so she can give you answers or help you guide she's provocative she really asks you so I see founders when I work with them on longer projects they become nervous you know because I'm not satisfied with first answer they gave me I can serve everybody super great yeah or now we will go to five countries immediately super great and she will ask you pretty much the same questions that I do and she will also give you more answers that I can give you because it's AI so it's based on AI but it was trained on sales booster framework on challenger sell approaches on proper qualification and I think you know for paying sales coach per hour when you start as a startup you cannot afford and you would like to work in the middle of the night in the middle in the morning you know different time zones so I think Petra is perfect for that and if you will ask her how to lose weight she will say no I don't know that yeah go and ask whoever yeah so they will give you generalistic answers she's sales coach

SPEAKER_00:

yeah just a sales coach well it's cool to have a 24-7 sales coach I mean I think that who would not want to have a 24-7 coach of anything I mean I think I could probably use that in my own personal life. And maybe I need some other sorts of coaches that are like that. How do you, how do you see that like Petra AI and sorts of solutions like this expanding into other parts of business? Can we replace other, I guess, people in the organization that we might need 24 seven access to? Is there like a Petra AI that we can use for like my sales manager in case I have a question or like an operations person, or can I clone like, or yeah, or maybe agents or one of the other use cases at least that I thought, maybe you've thought of this too, is like, at least in the United States, there's a lot of aging people that are leaving the workforce and like all that knowledge goes out the door with them, like if they have 40 years experience. So could we clone those people so they can kind of stay with the organization to help us out as far as all that knowledge before they leave and go play golf? I don't know. Is that something that you've thought of as far as other use cases?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I mean, I'm thinking a lot about, you know, how about AI in general, yeah? You know, is it a bad thing or a good thing? I'm a sociologist, yeah, so I have have also these ethical questions and everything which goes along so yeah every invention is something that can bring positive and negative but in case of AI everything which is repeatable it will be you know like every invention it was you know start what was repeatable and I think it's not much different how we can use it I still think and I see this when you know when I check the questions of people who are using Petra AI again you know it can help you more if you know more so it will guide you more if you ask questions that are really painful so I always say don't be nice with her yeah use her because it's there for you and you know more you will ask her tough questions more direct answers you will receive more generalistic you are more generalistic your answers will be and this is in general I think with AI yeah so we as human we still need to keep up with that. And from the sociologist's perspective, our society, I believe, will divide a little bit. Even bigger disruption, it will be between those who improve and grow and the one left behind. So this is something we have to take care of. I know it's a different topic, but you asked me about how I see AI. So I think you have to do something here in order to bring the whole society and to upskill as much as possible, you know, all the generations That's

SPEAKER_00:

a great question. And I think with that, how are salespeople going to use AI to screw up the buyer journey? Like, how are we just going to totally dismantle, I guess, any trust in the process by using AI, whether that's just, I don't know, automation or finding out information that is not useful or not connecting with the people in a human way? How are we going to screw it up?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I mean, as a seller, of course, the buyers are more empowered, we have to be more empowered, and we have to be even more hyper-personalized, or however we call this. We need to cut through the noise, we need to be specialists, you know, even more, even harder, we need to know, and this segment of one, how to answer the questions in the right moment to the right, you know, it's really, I think it's painful for sellers, yeah, because this is so, you know, before it was like, when sales, you know, sales is really long profession, yeah, when they come, they arrive to the market, and they explain and they have knowledge and they show and nobody knows. Now the features functions, everything is there, the comparison is there, everything is there. So you really have to niche to the hyper-personalized message and this is where AI can help you prepare and then you do your magic. So it's still a relationship, but just hyper-personalized relationship. You will really know this guy or lady to whom you will sell. Otherwise you will be just, one of them.

SPEAKER_00:

That's a great aspect, I think, of AI and just doing research. I think, as I mentioned maybe before, I do a tremendous amount of research of the companies I'm trying to do business with, the people that are in there, all the stakeholders. Obviously, I think that if you're doing research today, you have an advantage because you can probably do it faster with AI. So everybody should be able to put on a better face, so to speak, as far as knowing your customers. But I still see there's probably limitations or maybe adopting to new technologies that people still just lag behind historically so you know do you see I guess that opportunity to get to know your buyers better by using AI at least just from a knowledge download perspective before we reach out to them before we pick up the phone or before we you know see them in person I feel like it has to be a hybrid of both it can't just be all one or the other but I feel like with most new tools that are out there we go completely overboard as far as just you know AI everything we're just going to AI our emails we're going to AI our phone calls our outreach we're going to auto to make this, that and the other. So what do you see it as like augmenting or do you think we're just going to overdo it?

SPEAKER_02:

Of course, I already see that there is people who are overdoing it. You probably receive emails which are spam, LinkedIn messaging that is, you know, all over the place and you see it's nothing in there, just, you know, the process flowed from a robot. So we are already doing it. There are also a lot of tech tools which are out there and are actually hurting sellers and the sales process. And the sellers who should learn how to do it has negative connotation exactly for that. I know when I was trying to teach back in Microsoft, when Sales Navigator came out and we have this digital seller empowerment or something like that, people were really defensive for that because it was like everything are now influencers and you are offensive sending DM. So there are some cultural things that needs to go on And there are some barriers that we are not allowed to cross, at least yet, in different cultures. But there are still some stuff that we have to progress as sellers, yeah? So my job, when I coach, I need to move some traditional sellers into directions to use new tools. But on the other side, I have to un-teach someone. It's not just, you know, the tech will do everything and you don't need to sell. Wrong. The basic craft of selling, you still have to learn, yeah? and the basic principles of social interaction, with tech or without tech.

SPEAKER_00:

How do you teach founders and sales as far as differentiation? From my perspective, it's, you know, number one, as far as what you should lead with before you even start talking about features and benefits. How do you weave that into Petra AI, sales booster? Is that something that's a common topic around your sales training?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, yeah. Of course, the differentiation is some of the key factors of value proposition. So how you differentiate to the manual tunes, to the competition, to the existing stuff, to status quo, let's say, or, you know, doing nothing. And of course, to find your own niche, why you will bring value. And sometimes you bring value because there are all tech solutions. Yeah. So like Petra AI or some other sales coach or chat GPT, you know, you can do it. Yeah. So what's the differentiator is like how I will do it, how I will help you connect the dots, how I will do the package. Or maybe it's the language. Sometimes it's the availability. So let's find why people cannot live without your solution. Let's find out what is a little bit different. So it's a process, you know, but it doesn't need to be a unique solution. It has to be a unique service that you are providing, not just feature and functions. A unique problem that you solve in a unique way, not just a problem, in a unique way. Or affordable or I don't know, the language way.

SPEAKER_00:

But it starts with asking questions, right? I mean, you have to figure out which one of those is going to be the fit or a combination of all of them, but you just have to ask questions and ask more questions until you feel tired of asking questions. So at least you can get all the answers. I know one of the best sales trainings that I ever did a long time ago, I think we had to sit there and ask questions for like 45 minutes to the person on the other side of the table. And it was something that was very unnatural. But the more you do it, the more you learn, the more comfortable you get asking more questions to the point of where, I don't know, for me, I thought it was very effective. But I think it's good training that most people don't do, which is asking question after question after

SPEAKER_02:

question. Yeah, and you can eliminate that by pre-work. You can use the tech that is available to get answers before, to ask all the tools that are available. And then, you know, you can ask the relevant questions that you didn't get answers in your pre-work to the customer yeah so they will not be you know they will not hate you for you know you just ask questions so prepare yourself do your homework yeah

SPEAKER_00:

yeah of course it has to be like most things it has to be a hybrid of both a good mix and I think from a sociologist standpoint or just a human standpoint you want to ask questions so the other person feels like you're interested in learning more about them and their business and how you're solving their problems so I don't know like anything else it's a balance right

SPEAKER_02:

it's a

SPEAKER_00:

balance exactly all right let's Let's move to our most favorite segment, burn it or build it, at least my favorite segment in the household here. This is a rapid fire segment as far as the hot takes and sales and marketing. So we're just going to go through like 10 things and kind of get your perspective on what you think we should burn and what do you think we should build. So we will start with industry conferences, burn it or build it.

SPEAKER_02:

Build it, yeah, but get ready before, not just go there.

SPEAKER_00:

It's kind of like sales, right? You do some prep, understand like why you're going to go there. What people do you want? A lot of people show up just to show up and, you know, hand out pens. I don't know. AI outbound at scale.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. I mean, I don't like it as you imagine. Yeah. I would say burn it because, you know, it's, it's automated. It's not personalized and, you know, it's not there yet. So no quality beats quantity.

SPEAKER_00:

Burn it. All right. What about gated content? So content that's on a website, you might have to pay for it, put in an email address. Should it be gated, burn it or build it?

SPEAKER_02:

I think it's a little bit outdated yet. It depends on the business. But overall, in generic, I would say burn it because, you know, you can receive value for free and then do the funnel and, you know, build it on pre-qualify. I call this, you know, the qualification. Somebody, they will come to you. They will learn and burn it.

SPEAKER_00:

Burn it. Got it. Some people say that founders make the best sales hires. Burn it or build it?

SPEAKER_02:

Build it. For early stage founders, it needs to be sellers because they understand the value. They know why they build it. And somebody else cannot say the value that they can. So I believe that founder-led sales is the most important step. So build it.

SPEAKER_00:

Gotcha. Build it, official. Build it. What about cold calling?

SPEAKER_02:

yeah I know that people don't like it but warming up yeah so do the pre-work and then still call I wouldn't burn it I would burn the automated cold calling yeah with the guy hello and no pre-work of course but if you do your targeting ICP and warming up and something before if the process is there I would go to calling is it still cold calling or is it just warm calling

SPEAKER_00:

warm calling we'll go with no decision on that one so it depends Okay, it depends.

SPEAKER_02:

It depends. This is the consultant answer, so it depends.

SPEAKER_00:

Gotcha. It depends. Exactly. Some people say that website is your top salesperson. Burn it or build it?

SPEAKER_02:

Build it. Yeah. There is the value that people see and go and check.

SPEAKER_00:

Gotcha. And on these websites, number seven, public pricing on your website. I mean, it depends as far as your business, of course, but is it better to have just that transparency up front or not? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

I mean, if you have a product that to sell, then have transparency. If everything is customizable, then obviously you cannot have it,

SPEAKER_00:

yeah. Okay. Founder origin stories. So in a lot of cases, whether you're founder-led, you know, we're talking about that we built it in a garage and look at us now, or I think even in some legacy companies that I came from, we're 150 years old. Let's talk about our origin story from 1802. Burn it or build it?

SPEAKER_02:

When you say it like that, then burn it. But in reality, build founders story just don't go into you know the whole emotion and influencer stuff it's not about again it's not about you as a founder it's about the problem that you're solving so

SPEAKER_00:

yeah exactly so maybe pare it down a little bit just not five

SPEAKER_02:

slides it's not just about

SPEAKER_00:

you okay webinars for legion

SPEAKER_02:

burn it I think this is a little bit it was too much and also in covid you know it was you know really important and now it's so many other stuff that unless it's really targeted and you really have something to say. In general, if we would have a webinar about how to talk to buyers nowadays, I don't think anybody will join us. Burn it.

SPEAKER_00:

Gotcha. I think burning is leading this. Sales and marketing, combine those to make one RevOps leader. Most people say sales and marketing are not aligned, so do we combine it into one?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, build it. I was working in the company being on the buyer side i need this as one people are so disconnected and you know we sellers never liked marketers but we are one so yeah let's have end-to-end process let's build it yes marketing what is called it's marketing i'd read in a book

SPEAKER_00:

okay very cool nice well that's the finale there for burn it or build it i think that's a good one to end on and as far as ending on one final thought from you as far as just one takeaway that i'm a vice president of sale in my car listening to this podcast and I want to implement something today, what would you advise to them as far as something that they can help their team roll out to be better at sales?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I thought this was, you know, this was more common than I see it now in reality. But actually introduce like deal review power hour, not like just pipe deal review or deal inspection, but this critical thinking collaborative selling because we learn from each other and And it will sync your team, also marketing and sales, and it will focus your sellers. So you can build on that to coach. So I would go with a kind of sales cadence. It's not just from the corporation stuff, but I really see it work. It's deal review power hour. And I see this with startups with whom I work like on a regular basis. We need to go through pipe because they believe something is relevant. It's not they didn't do the qualifying. They are waiting for waiting, you know. And it doesn't really matter if you are long-time sellers. Me, I still have to go through my deals. Yeah, I have to qualify, re-qualify. Yeah, of course, I'm on my own. But basically, yeah, if I would be a VP of big or small organization or a startup, do deal review power hour. Yeah, and coach and learn from each other. It will help you build your playbook and be more efficient on the field later on.

SPEAKER_00:

Love it. Deal Review Power Hour. You heard it here first on Burn the Playbook in order to build the playbook. Thank you, Petra.

SPEAKER_02:

You're

SPEAKER_00:

welcome. All right. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02:

Bye-bye. Ciao.

SPEAKER_00:

That's how you burn the playbook. If this conversation fired you up, don't let it in here. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Share this episode with someone who's tired of playing by the old rules. And if you're ready to challenge your own sales approach, let's connect. Find me on LinkedIn at Mark Crosby or head to digitalrebelsconsulting.com Until next week, keep burning what's not working and keep building what is.