SaaStr 2018: How to Build an Outbound Sales Team

On Wednesday, we arrived 25 minutes early to How to Build an Outbound Sales Team in Studio E.

The panel was moderated by Aaron Ross, who I saw speak last year at SaaStr 2017 Day 3. I recall immediately buying his book From Impossible to Inevitable.

I was eager to learn new outbound strategies this year.

Man, the room was uncomfortably packed. Like last year, people were standing, sitting in the aisle and seated on the carpet up front.

The panel was made up of:

• Aaron Ross, Author – PredictableRevenue.com
• Mélanie Attia, VP Marketing – Vanilla Forums
• Scott Wong, Manager of Sales – Corral / Axia Technologies
• Mackenzi Farsheed, Director of Demand Gen and Marketing – MindFire Inc.

Here are my takeaways from How to Build an Outbound Sales Team:

• Growth companies hire SDR’s from within. Not outsourced.
• Internal SDR teams always give better results.
• Aaron Ross: Ideally start with 2 SDRs.
• Aaron: It’ll take 4-6 months to get pipeline consistently working.
• Aaron: It takes 2-3 years to show big results.
• Management commitment and patience is important.
• Aaron: 5-15 qualified appointments per month is industry standard.
• Mélanie Attia: The phone is your best friend.
• Aaron: Check and audit every opportunity that goes to quota. Do not let up on quality.
• Scott Wong: As an SDR manager, challenge your SDRs.
• Mackenzi Farsheed: Train SDRs to weave in price in the qualifying call.
• Scott: Hire people first, talent second.
• Mélanie: Don’t be afraid to ask for help.
• Mackenzi: Start now and document along the way.
• Mackenzi: Missed appointments and non-qualified meetings were problems early on.
• Align the SDR program with the bottom line.
• Melanie: Build strong Customer Success stories to support SDRs; focus on tangible results; be in sync with marketing.

About SaaStr Annual

The room was packed.

SaaStr Annual is the largest non-vendor confab in the world, uniting the global B2B SaaS community both online and off. SaaStr Annual aims to help everyone scale faster and with less stress.

In 2018, over 10,000 Founders, Senior Executives, and VCs will come together over three action-packed days of high-quality networking, learning from those who’ve done it, and of course, great food, generously-poured drinks, and plenty of fun.