Ep 115 Autobooks Connecting Sales with Marketing (with Derik Sutton and Kyle Bazzy)
Aug 9, 2023
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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.
AutoBooks implemented a customer-centric approach, focusing on customer progress and needs, which led to improved sales outcomes.
By integrating their marketing with their sales processes and adopting a jobs-to-be-done framework, AutoBooks achieved better alignment, improved conversations, and increased customer success.
Deep dives
Transitioning and Rethinking Operations at AutoBooks
The podcast episode explores how AutoBooks underwent a major transformation by rethinking and retooling their entire business operations. The company recognized the need to scale and grow, and to make the business work more efficiently and effectively. This involved transitioning away from founder-led sales and rebuilding their sales and marketing processes. The key turning point was when they adopted the concept of demand side sales, focusing on the progress and needs of their customers rather than internal metrics. Through this approach, they redefined their pipeline stages, aligned marketing and sales, and built a common language and methodology for the organization. The podcast highlights the challenges, insights, and successes they experienced throughout this process.
The Shift to Customer Progress and Demand Side Sales
AutoBooks embraced the concept of customer progress and demand side sales to transform their approach. Rather than relying on traditional marketing and sales metrics, they focused on understanding the progress their customers were making in their journey. They shifted away from marketing and sales qualified leads towards identifying customer progress stages such as passive looking, active looking, deciding, first use, and ongoing use. This allowed them to have more meaningful conversations with prospects and tailored their messaging and processes accordingly. By aligning marketing and sales and adopting this customer-centric approach, they witnessed a significant improvement in the quality of conversations, demos, and ultimately, their sales outcomes.
Building a Cohesive Sales and Marketing Strategy
AutoBooks recognized the importance of building a cohesive sales and marketing strategy. They focused on integrating their marketing efforts with their sales processes, moving away from working in silos. By adopting a jobs-to-be-done framework, they were able to understand why their customers hired them and tailor their messaging accordingly. This new strategy allowed them to speak the language of their prospects, understand their needs, and guide them throughout their entire journey. AutoBooks also revolutionized their demo process, simplifying slides and focusing on asking questions that aligned with the progress their customers were aiming to achieve. By connecting their marketing and sales initiatives and focusing on customer progress, AutoBooks achieved better alignment, improved conversations, and increased customer success.
The Impact of Customer-Centric Approach on Sales and Scaling
The customer-centric approach at AutoBooks has had a significant impact on their sales and scaling efforts. By shifting the focus from company metrics to customer progress, they were able to better qualify leads, align sales and marketing efforts, and optimize the overall sales process. They implemented changes in their commission structure, incentivizing success post-go-live instead of just closing deals. This approach ensured that salespeople were motivated to secure successful customers who achieved long-term value. The results have been remarkable, with AutoBooks scaling from a handful of institutions to nearly 1,500 financial institutions under contract. The success they achieved through their customer-centric approach validates the efficacy of their strategy and highlights the importance of aligning sales, marketing, and customer success for sustainable growth.
In our upcoming BoS USA conference in Raleigh NC on 2-4 October, we're doing a really interesting afternoon digging into a case study with the great folks at Autobooks. Mark sits down with to of the four Autobookers taking to the stage in the fall to discuss connecting sales with marketing. Happy listening!
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