20Sales: The 3 Profiles of a Sales Rep, How to Negotiate in a Sales Process, How to Sell to a CFO & How You Should Shift Sales Messaging in a Downturn with Frank Fillmann, CRO @ Salesforce Australia

Frank Fillmann is CRO/Country Leader Australia for Salesforce where he is responsible for responsible for the overall strategy, execution, success, and growth of the $1B+ Australian market across all industries. Prior to Salesforce, Frank was SVP/GM @ Tableau where he was responsible for the strategy, execution, and growth of Tableau’s Top Accounts. Over the last 10 years at Salesforce, Frank’s accomplishments include $500M+ new revenue closed in 5 years and $1B+ revenue managed. As a result, Frank has been awarded #1 Sales VP of the Year, North America, 3 times! Huge thanks to Zhenya Loginov @ Miro for the intro to Frank today.

In Today’s Episode with Frank Fillmann We Discuss:

1.) From Selling Kitchen Utensils to Leading $1BN Revenue Line for Salesforce:

• How did Frank first make his way into the world of sales selling kitchen utensils?

• Why does Frank believe, “how you handle tragedy defines you”? How did it define him?

• What does Frank know now that he wishes he had known when he started in sales?

2.) Build and Execute the Sales Playbook:

• How does Frank define what a “sales playbook” is today? What is it not?

• Literally, what are the first steps to building a sales playbook? Is it the founder who does it?

• What does a good playbook have? What does a bad playbook have? What makes the best?

• What tools should founders and sales leaders use to create their playbook?

3.) Enterprise Deal Dynamics 101:

• Why does Frank believe that you should never start with the price or “send over numbers”?

• How can enterprise sellers create urgency in a deal cycle? What works? What does not work?

• How does Frank advise sales teams on the use of discounting?

• How open should reps be in communicating the win for them as well as the win for the customer of closing a deal?

4.) Building the Bench:

• How does Frank structure the hiring process for all new sales reps?

• Why does Frank believe that all sales leaders want to be super reps?

• How does Frank rank high potential vs high experience when hiring reps?

• What matters more; the exec have experience in the sector you are selling into or the deal size?

• What are the single biggest mistakes founders and leaders make when hiring sales?

5.) Setting Quota and Deal Reviews:

• How does Frank advise founders on setting quotas? Why does Q1 set the tone for the year?

• How does Frank conduct deal reviews? How often? With who? What is the agenda?

• What is the one question that Frank always asks when a rep says, “the client told us it was not a priority and so it slipped into next quarter”?

• How does Frank advise founders and sales leaders on multi-threading large enterprise accounts?

Items Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Frank’s Most Recent Book: The Go-Giver: A Little Story About a Powerful Business Idea