MV #002: Value is King
Lessons, stories, observations and analyses on software sales, building companies and creating customer value.
Read time: 6 min
👋 Hi there, happy Sunday!
📦 What’s inside?
Thank you for subscribing. As promised, in my weekly edition of More Value, you’ll get 4 things delivered directly to your inbox.
Curated highlights from thought leaders in B2B software
Lessons on how to become a better value seller
Analyses and observations from the B2B software industry
Unfiltered, personal stories from working in big tech and startups
🤓 Who am I?
My name is Semir Jahic. I’m a self-confessed news junkie, and I’m also a student of startups and obsessed with what it takes to build something of value.
In More Value, I’ll share what I’m reading, learning, and observing to help you create more value.
More value is for go-to-market professionals in Sales, Customer Success, Delivery or anywhere in the enterprise software industry.
If that’s you, keep reading.
🥞 Sunday Pancake Recap
#1 Innovator’s Dilemma gone wrong
Snap shuts down Zenly despite the success
Imagine this. You’re a publicly listed social media company trying to drive user growth. You buy a growing company with 35 million monthly active users (MAU) and only 70 employees.
What do you do?
Well, in the case of Snap SNAP 0.00%↑ , the company known for Snapchat, you shut it down. (more on Techcrunch)
🤯
Exactly. That is a massive surprise. Snap bought the French company for $200m, they left it to operate and innovate independently of the parent organisation. And now, Zenly was part of a major restructuring of the company. Snap shut it down. This is despite (or maybe because of) its amazing metrics, especially in markets where Snap is weaker, i.e. South East Asia.
There are rumours that “Snap does not want to create competition by selling Zenly.” (see Pragmatic Engineer). Kind of an innovator’s dilemma gone wrong situation.
Michael Jackson’s, a French VC, take is that this could be a boon for the European and the French tech ecosystem. Lots of qualified startup builders are now looking to do their next thing. VCs are keen to write checks for them. This could create huge value for the European ecosystem soon. (see his take on LinkedIn)
I guess one’s loss is another’s gain.
#2 The value of brand
Great post (here) this week by Daniel Hochuli from LinkedIn. In a sea of sameness, it’s impossible to stand out with your product alone.
For us go-to-market professionals, you must first get a seat at the table to sell the value. Turns out that value selling starts much earlier and is something the whole company must do. It starts with the very first touchpoint that a prospect has with your brand.
No feature or solution will help you get a seat at the table. Buyers want low friction, low effort, and value upfront when they look at purchasing a solution.
Look at the below chart. There are 797 CRMs. Yes, 797. If you’re looking for a solution, where are you going to look? The top 3. You take it from there and go deeper.
💥 Boom 794 solutions have not even had a chance to talk to your brilliant SDR and get a pitch from your AE and SE.
Source: G2 Crowd (https://www.g2.com/categories/crm#grid)
All these companies above think they create value for their end-user in a unique way. I’m sure they all do somehow. But they will never succeed if they don’t even get a seat at the table.
Value is king. But you need to communicate that. Position the value. Articulate the value. Be at the right place and time with the right message to deliver value.
That’s why branding is an important part of selling value. Brand is what gets you a seat at the table in the first place. It’s what helps you stand out.
We’ve all heard it before:
“No one ever got fired for buying IBM.”
The same applies to CRM:
“No one ever got fired for buying Salesforce.”
Buying software is hard. It’s time-consuming. It’s resource-intensive. No buyer will evaluate all CRMs when they do their research. They will look at the top 2 or 3 on their shortlist. It’s not uncommon that the vendor who wins the deal is not the one with the best product. Shocking right?
Focus on great top-of-funnel content and let your brand team get you on the shortlist. At this point, you might be wondering. How can I help?
The answer is: Invest in a great team that can focus on building your brand and let them do their job.
Enjoyed how Chris Lochhead put it this week (see full post here)
If you’re in marketing, I highly recommend this read on LinkedIn by Gaetano on how Google is trialling “helpful content”. The algorithms are constantly evolving, and knowing how you can rank better will increase the chance of getting your team a seat at the table.
🐦 Tweet of the Week
Source: Twitter
🥹 Missed my posts this week? - Fret not!
How I came back inspired by the Swiss startup ecosystem.
The importance of execution. The only way to build pipeline by execution.
Why having skin in the game is a great way to get unstuck in deals and build trust
Ever read an email going like this: Sorry for the long email. Here’s my take.
🗞️ In other news
🚨 Spoiler alert: the macro environment is worsening. Big tech and startups have to expect more turbulence.
Bloomberg reports Salesforce, ServiceNow Suffer as Customers Delay Software Deals (full article).
The software sector is down 27% this year, and there’s no end in sight. Bloomberg analysed earnings transcripts, and longer sales cycles have been mentioned 52 times in calls with top software companies. So, what are companies doing? They are adjusting. One way to do that is with layoffs (see Zenly story above or read below how Meta uses an algorithm to axe staff)
Jamin Ball reports in Clouded Judgement that some Q2 earnings might still be strong, but many are forecasting lower guidance due to the shifting environment. This also applies to smaller tech companies and will be similar at tech startups.
Here’s a graphic with quotes that Jamin put together. (see full report here)
Dazeinfo reports that some big tech companies go a step further in dehumanising the layoff process. Apparently, “Meta has started laying off employees who were chosen randomly by an algorithm to get fired.” This is an obvious reaction to the changes in the market. (full article here)
Jaleh Rezaei posted on Twitter what she sees happening in a startup board rooms right now.
🤓 My take on this week’s news?
The macro environment is worsening. Q2 earnings are mostly over. Companies might not have seen the full impact yet. Most of the slowdown started in June/July. There will be a certain lag until the full impact of the raised interest rates and other macro factors like inflation hit the sales pipelines.
I expect Q3/Q4 to clearly show who faces headwinds and how strong. I’m sure there will be tailwinds for some too. For many, however, it’ll be headwinds.
What can you do as a salesperson?
Get the deal in now if you can before budgets freeze
Accept that you probably won’t get a multi-year commitment now
Use all resources, including from cross-functional partners, to sell
Deeply evaluate your ROI/value case for prospects. It will be scrutinised.
Empathise with the buyer and the impact macro has on them.
Note: Everyone - SDR, CSM, PS, SE, leaders - should make sure to do #5.
🙏 That’s it. Thank you for reading.
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Have a great Sunday!
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