Business of Software Podcast Ep 115 Autobooks Connecting Sales with Marketing (with Derik Sutton and Kyle Bazzy)
Aug 9, 2023
Explore Autobooks' journey in restructuring its operations, transitioning into new roles, aligning sales incentives with customer success, controversial scaling strategies, early stages of implementing sales and marketing, and their excitement for an upcoming session at BoS USA conference.
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Align Sales And Marketing Around Customer Progress
- Scaling requires aligning sales and marketing around customer progress rather than internal funnel metrics.
- Autobooks adopted demand-side sales (jobs-to-be-done) to make pipeline stages reflect prospects' progress from first thought to ongoing use.
Stock CMO Answers Proved Hiring Outside Would Hurt Continuity
- Kyle recounts interviewing external CMOs and realizing they gave stock answers that would break the company's continuity.
- That convinced them to promote Derek internally to preserve the company's founder-rooted messaging and culture.
Turn Demo From A Noun Into A Verb
- Thinking of the demo as a verb (an activity that advances customer progress) reframes where demos belong in the buying journey.
- This reduces supply-side religiosity around demos and focuses on whether a demo meaningfully advances the customer's decision stage.