The GTM Podcast

Sophie Buonassisi is the Vice President of Marketing at GTMfund, overseeing GTMnow - the media arm of the GTMfund brand - and the internal community. She's passionate about empowering go-to-market leaders and founders with access to insight through GTMnow's channels, like this podcast, the newsletter, and more. Before joining the GTMfund team, she built and scaled GTM at a predictive conversion optimization company. She enjoys advising SaaS companies as they build out and optimize their marketing and overall GTM strategies. What you will learn Highlights (3:45) Who's Sophie and how she ended up at GTMfund (6:31) How Sophie stood out during an application process of 400+ people (11:15) How to be proactive about finding a new role when you haven't identified what that role is exactly (17:21) Knowing how to navigate the interview process systematically (22:41) How to leverage your community to endorse you (26:49) How to effectively nail a take home assignment (32:30) The importance of understanding your future employer deeply (35:35) How to hit the ground running before your start date (40:05) Top tips for landing page conversion optimization Links and Resources Sophie's Linkedin: https://ca.linkedin.com/in/sophiebuonassisi Our Sponsor Today's episode is sponsored by Demandbase, Demandbase helps B2B companies hit their revenue goals using fewer resources. How? By using the power of AI to identify and engage the accounts and buying groups most likely to purchase. They combine your sales and marketing data with our validated B2B data and AI to create Account Intelligence that informs every step of your buyer's journey. They deliver accurate company, contact, technographic, engagement, and intent data right where you work every day – CRM, collaboration tools, browsers, and more. Start spotting opportunities earlier and orchestrate smarter sales and marketing motions with Demandbase. See this live in action: https://www.demandbase.com/product-tour/sales-intelligence/ The GTM Podcast Don't miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Zach Lawryk is currently the Head of Global Solutions Consulting at Rippling, previously the VP of Solutions Consulting at Slack, Director of Sales Engineering at Box, and really began his career in tech at Salesforce as a Sales Engineer in 2005. What you will learn Highlights (3:41) How Zach has successfully landed at power house companies and how to identify those companies (8:16) Zach’s snowball effect of building relationships in the workplace (11:10) The energy you put out always comes back to you (19:30) When the sales engineer role got pioneered (21:43) The SE/SC role evolving with AI (29:11) AI experiments that Rippling is currently running (34:49) When to invest in solution engineers (37:30) Benchmark for the bump in win rate after bringing in SC/SE’s (42:07) Gauging the complexity high water marker (44:35) Practicing transparency with the value you provide (48:07) The power of video content that Rippling is currently leveraging Links and Resources Zach's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zlawryk/ Our Sponsor Today’s episode is sponsored by Demandbase, Demandbase helps B2B companies hit their revenue goals using fewer resources. How? By using the power of AI to identify and engage the accounts and buying groups most likely to purchase. They combine your sales and marketing data with our validated B2B data and AI to create Account Intelligence that informs every step of your buyer’s journey. They deliver accurate company, contact, technographic, engagement, and intent data right where you work every day – CRM, collaboration tools, browsers, and more. Start spotting opportunities earlier and orchestrate smarter sales and marketing motions with Demandbase. See this live in action: https://www.demandbase.com/product-tour/sales-intelligence/ The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

This week we have a special 2 guest episode, with the best hiring guru's in the game, Chuck Brotman & David Teichner. Chuck is the co-founder of Blueprint Expansion, a GTM roles recruiting firm that has helped over 50 VC-backed companies make amazing Sales, Marketing, & Customer Success hires. Prior to starting Blueprint in 2020, he worked for over fifteen years in various sales and sales management roles, building teams across presales, partnerships, SMB, Mid-Market, & Enterprise Sales. Chuck lives in the Bay Area with his wife and has two daughters, a junior at UCLA and a freshman at UC Santa Barbara. David has 25 years under his belt as a serial entrepreneur. Built and exited companies in MarTech, FinTech and Media. He's invested and advised for over a dozen companies, and launched AccelerateHC seven years ago to help companies think through the organization they need and ultimately help them recruit high performing talent. What you will learn Highlights (1:35) How Chuck initially started his career in recruiting (4:40) How David got drawn into recruiting (9:10) Generalists vs Specialists for Seed/SeriesA startups, which should you pick? (14:00) How to decrease the chance of making a bad hire at the early stage (21:00) The importance of implementing a strong process when hiring talent (22:38) Maximum number of skills/behaviours you can test for during an interview process (25:27) Optimal length for an interview process (30:05) How to test for ethereal factors that you can’t put on paper in an interview (35:10) When budgets are tight, who do you opt in for, another AE or a sales leader (38:29) How to navigate the ‘lead’ roles / player coaches (40:50) Hot Take: The “Hire slow and Fire fast” mentality no longer serves us (41:45) Hiring people for their titles and hot logo’s on their resume does not guarantee success Links and Resources If you're looking for any help with your hiring process, fill out This 3 Question Typeform and we'll connect you directly with Chuck and David If you're a talented go-to-marketer on the job hunt, fill out This Short Typeform to help get placed in your next perfect home! Our Sponsor Today's episode is sponsored by DemandBase, Demandbase helps B2B companies hit their revenue goals using fewer resources. How? By using the power of AI to identify and engage the accounts and buying groups most likely to purchase. They combine your sales and marketing data with our validated B2B data and AI to create Account Intelligence that informs every step of your buyer’s journey. They deliver accurate company, contact, technographic, engagement, and intent data right where you work every day - CRM, collaboration tools, browsers, and more. Start spotting opportunities earlier and orchestrate smarter sales and marketing motions with Demandbase. See this live in action: https://www.demandbase.com/product-tour/sales-intelligence/ The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

We have a special episode this week, a community mashup with the best community leaders in the game! Pavilion's SVP of Marketing, Kathleen Booth, The founder of Salesforce's Trailblazer's Community, Erica Kuhl, and The Former Director of Community for Salesforce's Trailblazer Community as well as The Former Head of Global Community at Atlassian, Holly Firestone. What you will learn Highlights (1:15) Kathleen Booth explains why community is more important than ever (6:34) How to advise early stage SaaS companies on how to leverage community to drive revenue and demand (16:00) Erica Kuhl unpacks the oversaturation of community today and how to overcome that (20:00) Maintain quality members as you scale (25:07) Building Salesforce Trailblazer's, walking through what worked and what didn't (33:00) Holly Firestone's time at Atlassian, scaling, tracking, and optimizing for signifcant growth (42:00) Some mistakes that Holly made as the Director Community with Salesforce's Trailblazers (46:20) Mistakes that Erica Kuhl made during her time at Salesforce Links & Resources Kathleen Booth's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathleenslatterybooth/ Erica Kuhl's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ericakuhl/ Holly Firestone's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hollygfirestone/ The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Mark Cranney is an enterprise go-to-market operator and three-time unicorn creator. Most recently, he was the COO at Skydio. He's also a founding operating partner at Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and has been involved in the acquisitions of Opsware and Aster Data Systems by HP and Teradata, respectively. Mark specializes in developing winning playbooks, cultures, and strategies that put his competition on the back foot. What You'll Learn Episode Highlights (03:48) The books that shaped Mark's winning culture (10:39) How to keep your competition at bay (14:10) Three questions to ask when scouting for culture-fit talent (15:46) How to keep recruited talent motivated (16:16) "Process triumphs heroics." How Mark created and used playbooks to create winning cultures (23:00) Why you need to get more granular in your competitive strategy (35:17) How to create a winning culture without turning your team's culture toxic.(37:18) "If it's not a competitive environment, for me, that's toxic." (39:09) Mark's parting advice Quotes "The winning general knows the outcome before the battle even starts." "You got to go where you can win, particularly when you don't have a lot of arrows in your quiver. You've got to make sure you're spending time in the right places, from a segmentation and targeting standpoint, until you build up the muscle where you can expand into other scenarios." "If it's not a competitive environment, for me, that's toxic." "If you have eight hours to chop down a tree, are you going to spend eight hours hacking away with a dull axe? Or are you going to spend seven of them sharpening the blade and an hour chopping the tree down?" "If you take a shortcut, there's always a consequence—and it's usually not a good one." Links & Resources Mark Cranney's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markcranney/ The Hard Thing About Hard Things, a book by Ben Horowitz What You Do Is Who You Are, a book by Ben Horowitz The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Dan Reich is a serial entrepreneur, investor, and writer and has been building companies since he was a teenager. Some of the companies that he founded include: TULA Skincare which was acquired by Proctor & Gamble - Troops.ai which was acquired by Salesforce - Spinback which was acquired by Buddy Media and then acquired by Salesforce. Dan is now a co-founder of Dibs Beauty, which is backed by LCatterton and is building more companies. He also invests through his family office, Reich Capital. He has a background in electrical engineering and volunteers as a member of national ski patrol. What you will learn How to keep your team motivated when momentum takes a hit Highlights (6:33) Influencer marketing in b2b (8:34) Tactics and strategies that b2b companies can steal from b2c companies today (13:00) How Dan structured a designated BDR team for influencer marketing (17:00) How to maintain authenticity when partnering with influencers (21:32) How to effectively compensate influencers: Equity vs Cash (24:20) Dan’s experience with 2 M&A exits (30:08) How to keep your team motivated in moments of momentum loss (32:28) How each acquisition began its first conversations (42:30) Why e-mail marketing is dead today (44:50) Finding gratitude and happiness within yourself will ultimately lead you toward success Quotes “Companies don’t buy companies, people at companies buy companies” “By grounding yourself with things that you’re really grateful for, when things don’t go well, it gives you perspective about what really matters and what doesn’t” “People that chase happiness will find success, and the people that chase success, most of the time, will never find happiness” Links and Resources Dan's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danreich/ Dan's Website: https://danreich.com DIBS Beauty Website: https://dibsbeauty.com The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Sam McKenna is the founder of SamSalesConsulting, previous to that she spent 6 years at On24 ending up as their VP of Enterprise Sales, She then jumped over to LinkedIn as their Head of Enterprise Sales. Sam is also an advisor for high growth companies. She now leads an all women team of 11, has over 180 clients, multiple million dollars in revenue, all under 4 years. What you will learn Highlights (3:40) Why building your digital footprint is more important than ever for founders (8:30) How to carve out time for thought leadership throughout busy times (13:00) Strategies from Sam’s playbook that people should implement when building their social (20:00) High impact strategies that Sam used to excel throughout her sales career (26:00) Walking the line between doing what works for you vs following playbooks given by your leaders (29:00) A framework for “show me you know me” in Sales (33:42) Hot take: Shorter e-mails are not the way to earn your ICP’s time (35:51) How to successfully hire for key roles (40:30) Hot take: Cold calling isn't the way to approach your ICP anymore (44:10) How to leverage data to prospect efficiently Quotes “You need to be sure that you’re hiring someone that truly has the mind share expertise of the platform” “I thought that If I could scale whatever we’re doing really well, show me you know me, I bet we could kill it” “Depending on the environment that you’re in, if you have wiggle room to try new things out, give it a shot” Links and Resources Sam’s Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samsalesli/ SamSalesConsulting: https://www.samsalesconsulting.com LinkedIn Influencer Playbook: https://shorts.samsalesconsulting.com/courses/linkedin-influencer-playbook The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Melanie Fellay is the CEO and Co-Founder of Spekit, a just-in-time platform that is transforming how we learn at work. Spekit meets reps with the process guidance, enablement and knowledge they need, right when they need it, in their flow of work to help them be more efficient, drive more revenue and eliminate the friction of change. She’s a Forbes 30 Under 30 recipient, Top 100 Female Entrepreneur to watch (Entrepreneur) and has been featured across Forbes, Entrepreneur, Fast Company, Business Insider and more. Mel co-founded Spekit with Zari Zahra to solve a simple challenge: how do we make sure employees know what they need to know, when and where they need to know it. Hundreds of the world's most innovative companies, including Uber Freight, Snowflake, Southwest Airlines and Invesco, rely on Spekit to empower their employees with real-time knowledge and training, without disrupting their day-to-day workflows.The company has raised $60M in venture funding from notable investors Craft Ventures. Felicis, Operator Collective, Matchstick Ventures, Renegade Partners, Foundry Group and Bonfire Ventures and more. What you will learn Narrowing the playing field and going where people aren't as a founderAlways be strategic and intentional when you go wideThe importance of customer facing as a founder Making hard decisions faster will only benefit your team's success long termProduct momentum comes from working well as an executive team Highlights (2:40) The importance of allowing your mind to rest (9:37) Mel’s founder journey that inspired her to build Spekit (15:44) How to go-to-market with a tool that tackles multiple categories (22:33) Customer facing as a founder shouldn't be overlooked (24:10) How Mel ended up having to step in as Spekit's CTO during the pandemic and her experience sitting in the engineering seat (34:08) How Mel took the mental strength to show up for her team when things were difficult (39:38) What Mel would tell her 25-year-old self (42:06) The Importance of networking and building your brand as a first-time founder (46:44) Figuring out how you work best as an executive team to increase product momentum Quotes "It's okay to solve different problems and go wide, but you need to have a very intentional strategy behind it" "At the end of the day you need to have smart and resilient people, but you need to have people who are driven on your particular problem" Links and Resources Mel's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melaniefellay/ Spekit's Website: https://spekit.com The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Meka Asonye is a Partner at First Round Capital based in San Francisco. Before moving into venture, Meka was an active angel investor backing companies such as Coda, Alchemy, Rimeto (acq. by Slack), Snackpass and Stytch. Previously, he served as the VP of Sales & Services at Mixpanel, where he ran the more than 100-person global revenue team. Before Mixpanel, Meka spent four years at Stripe and scaled and matured its sales organization during the company's rapid growth from 250 to 2000 people. Prior to joining Stripe, Meka served as Case Team Leader at Bain in San Francisco, partnering with the C-Suites of Fortune 50 companies across different verticals. Meka started his career working in Player Development & Baseball Operations for the Cleveland Indians. Meka earned a Bachelor of Arts degree cum laude in Economics and Finance from Princeton and his MBA from Harvard Business School P.S. We’re officially running a GTMfund giveaway program! Share your favourite media piece (GTM podcast or GTM newsletter) on LinkedIn and Twitter, tag us, and you’ll be entered to win a pair of GTMfund Airpod Pros! What you will learn Highlights (3:44) How Meka started his career in player development and baseball ops for the Cleveland Indians (8:50) Meka’s biggest challenges during his time at Stripe as the Head of Sales (10:15) How the SMB team measured success at Stripe and how it evolved over the years (13:14) Balancing lead distribution at Stripe (16:28) Practicing “Dumpster Diving” at Stripe (18:00) Setting up long term incentive structures at Stripe (22:48) How Meka began angel investing (28:10) What Meka learned from his first angel investing experience (36:22) The best way to start out in angel investing (39:42) Why traditional sales compensation models at early stage companies is flawed (42:00) The importance of educating your customers effectively through each touch Quotes “One of the things I look for out of founders is commercial orientation” “ I knew a little bit about what he was building but I really just made a bet on the person” “What makes you money and loses you money is the founder” Links and Resources Meka's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mekaasonye/ Meka's Twitter: https://twitter.com/BigMekaStyle Mekas's Email: Meka@fristround.com The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month

Eli Rubel is the CEO of MatterMade and NoBoringDesign, and has served as a Marketing advisor for companies like Dropbox, Loom, Productboard, Calm, and many others. Prior to MatterMade & NoBoringDesign, Eli was the founding CEO of Glider.com which he led through a successful acquisition to FPX. What you will learn Demand Efficiency Highlights (3:39) Defining Demand Efficiency (7:30) Shared data around good efficiency through channels (10:10) Common micro-surfaces that are often overlooked (13:10) Companies revisiting their brand guidelines and brand identity (15:24) Good conversion rates on ad spend for b2b SaaS companies (17:10) Things people should think about when analyzing their demand efficiency (18:10) Eli’s acquisition that went wrong (25:30) How to combat against acquisitions going wrong (28:00) Post acquisition shift - how to set yourself up (30:10) Founder Question: What your first marketing hire should look like (25:00) Hot take: LinkedIn is dying! (38:00) Operational excellence will set your team up for success every time Quotes “Demand efficiency as a definition, is the evaluation of all of the different micro surfaces and growth levers throughout the buyers journey and how they all stack up together” “Build a brand that’s extensible, you can still have fresh ads that are being changed up as long as the underlying brand foundations were created in a way that allow for creativity and experimentation” "When you combine curiosity, grit, and drive together, it doesn't matter what they know and what they don't know. Because they're going to figure it out and try" Links and Resources Eli's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elirubel/ MatterMade's Website: https://www.mattermade.co NoBoringDesign Website: https://www.noboringdesign.com The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Dave Gerhardt worked as a Senior Marketing Manager at Drift in 2015 and quickly grew into their VP of Marketing. Dave left Drift in 2019 to join Privy as their CMO for just under 2 years, then returned to Drift as a Chief Brand Officer. Dave now runs Exit Five, The #1 community for B2B Marketers. What you will learn Highlights (3:25) Shifting from a ‘Yes mindset’ to a ‘No mindset’ (12:10) How Dave grew into a VP level role at Drift (12:58) How Dave started his career at Drift (24:00) Moments in Dave’s career where he didn’t achieve his goals (28:48) Aligning revenue goals between Sales and Marketing (31:50) Getting people excited and engaged in Drifts product at an early stage (36:50) The pros and cons on starting a founder brand (40:39) How Dave measured success for his podcast as they started out (43:00) Hot take: Measuring everything in Marketing is no longer relevant (45:00) The importance of niching down to drive growth Dave's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davegerhardt/ Exit5 Community: https://www.exitfive.com The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Anna Baird started her career in Accounting helping with IPOs of companies like Google. She then moved to become an SVP at McAfee and when they sold to Intel she decided to work at start-ups so that she could help build the foundations at scale from the beginning. She became a CFO and then a COO and finally a CRO. Anna is now working on Boards to help other executives take advantage of the opportunities that they saw earlier and avoid some of the mistakes that she's faced at early stages ◡̈ What you will learn Highlights (6:13) What Anna has learned throughout her career selling into large strategic accounts (11:45) A walk through of Outreach’s deal review calls as a successful strategic tactic (15:45) How to prepare folks to make a strong ask that garners results (19:20) Anna’s impactful story that fueled her (22:55) A moment in time where Ana faced a struggle with misalignment (32:40) Anna’s advice to female leaders struggling to get promoted (37:40) Understanding where your hires skillsets are to be successful in your organization (42:10) Working in silos no longer works Quotes “I just wanna work with interest people, solving interesting problems, with people I enjoy and respect being around” “The only reason why we exist as a company, is because we’re solving a pain. Never lose track of why you exist and what is it that you’re building for” “Everyone wants to work for a place where they feel has a great foundation of innovation, great ideas, and different perspectives, and I feel that’s what the younger generation is excelling at” Links and Resources Anna's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anna-baird-38966513/ The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The .GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Bio Justin Welsh helped scale ZocDoc as the Director of Strategic Sales, and later joined PatientPop as the SVP of Sales. Justin currently has over 440k followers on Linkedin and Twitter, and 150k subscribers on the Saturday Solopreneur Newsletter. Justin is also an Angel investor and an advisor for early stage startups. Justin has bundled all of his learnings into 2 courses that he offers today: The Operating System Digital Course, teaching you how to build a viable meaningful business on Linkedin and the The Content OS Digital Course, which gives you a more holistic strategy around content. What you will learn Highlights (3:18) The evolution of Justin’s career growth as a Solopreneur (4:48) The courses Justin built on how to excel as a thought leader on Linkedin (6:33) How to crack the twitter code (13:25) Outsourcing creativity (14:50) Using a scheduler for content - which platforms Justin uses for scheduling (16:40) Justin’s take on threads (19:15) The impactful results that Justin saw as he kickstarted his solopreneur journey (22:17) Tips for executives and founders looking to build on Linkedin (25:00) Common mistakes that folks should avoid on Linkedin (27:00) Justin’s experience with burnout before he decided to bet on himself (31:35) Justin’s best advice to his younger self (33:26) How to motivate your hires to be more active on social (37:48) Hot take: Fire Fast! (41:55) Actionable tips that SaaS teams can implement to drive more inbound Quotes “It’s really about catching attention and stopping the scroll” "I fired myself before my boss could. I wish people would do that more" "How do you write, how do you sound, what's your voice: If you can nail those first 3 things for content, then you're in a really good spot" Links and Resources Justin's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/justinwelsh/ Justin's Twitter: https://twitter.com/thejustinwelsh Justin Welsh's Website: https://www.justinwelsh.me The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The .GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Presenting you with a very special bonus episode this month... Max Altschuler hits us with a very special announcment, Co-Hosted by the CEO and CoFounder of Outreach, Manny Medina Tune in to hear it all! P.S. We're officially running a GTMfund giveaway program! Share our media content (GTM podcast or GTM newsletter) on LinkedIn and Twitter, tag us, and you'll be entered to win a pair of GTMfund Airpod Pros! The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The .GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday, discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

James Isilay founded Cognism a B2B sales intelligence company together with Stjepan Buljat in 2015. James had previously worked as a quantitative trader and analyst and studied Information Systems Engineering. Cognism helps you identify your ideal customers globally, find others like them, and reach out when they are most likely to buy. P.S. We're officially running a GTMfund giveaway program! Share our media content (GTM podcast or GTM newsletter) on LinkedIn and Twitter, tag us, and you'll be entered to win a pair of GTMfund Airpod Pros! What you will learn Highlights (3:05) James’ career journey that led him to become a founder (8:09) Factors that drew James into being a financial trader early on in his career (14:55) James’ inflection point quitting his 9-5 to start Cognism (18:12) James’ learnings from his early days building Cognism (20:33) How James calibrated excellence across his team (27:08) Cognism's take on in office vs remote work (31:28) Listener question: The “need to haves” on a go-to-market tech stack (36:40) Hot take: every company should be expanding and building a sales capacity globally (42:38) Value loops and ungated content is the way to succeed Quotes “Tools can make certain metrics better, but you need human intelligence to evolve it to the next level” “Treat each country like a startup when joining a different global market” Links and Resources James' Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-isilay/ Cognism's Website: https://www.cognism.com The Diary of a First Time CMO book here: https://www.amazon.com/diary-first-time-CMO-Alice-Courcy/dp/B0BW2GWDQD/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8 The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The .GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Nicole is the VP of Marketing at Tackle, where she oversees the strategy and execution across brand, demand gen, content, product, customer, and partner marketing. She’s passionate about building GTM programs aligning cross-functional teams while scaling revenue. Before Tackle, she built and scaled the marketing team from the ground up at two previous SaaS companies.She enjoys advising early-stage SaaS companies as they build their marketing team and strategy. P.S. We're officially running a GTMfund giveaway program! Share our media content (GTM podcast or GTM newsletter) on LinkedIn and Twitter, tag us, and you'll be entered to win a pair of GTMfund Airpod Pros! What you will learn Highlights (3:17) The meaning of alignment between sales, marketing, & partnerships (5:35) The framework Nicole built to create better alignment between sales & marketing (11:03) How to extract data and diagnose a breakdown where problems are happening (13:10) The impact on Nicole’s company after rolling out her framework (16:08) What led Nicole to make changes within the sales and marketing org (17:45) How Nicole motivated her team to adjust to these changes (20:40) The importance of leading with data in every situation (23:47) Nicole’s operational shift error (26:53) Nicole’s biggest learnings and takeaways (28:07) Listener question: Where to allocate marketing dollars in demand gen today (30:15) Decreasing ad performance in today’s market (31:35) Hot take: 1 Marketer with 10 different roles isn’t the way to succeed (33:59) How to leverage AI for every possible role today Quotes “Whats our integrated theme for our next quarter, and how are we gonna infuse this into everything we’re doing” “Try and focus on the overall pipeline health of the company rather than just our single individual business unit” “Putting the bigger picture together around the campaigns and the strategy behind this, has been able to help us really show the results of all the efforts together” Links and Resources Nicole's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicolewojno/ The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The .GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Adam Schoenfeld is the Co-Founder & CEO at Keyplay, as well as the Co-Founder & Analyst at PeerSignal.org. Adam is a 4th time SaaS founder. His past includes Siftrock (acquired by Drift), Simply Measured, Product & Strategy VP at Drift, and a board member at Bizible. P.S. We're officially running a GTMfund giveaway program! Share our media content (GTM podcast or GTM newsletter) on LinkedIn and Twitter, tag us, and you'll be entered to win a pair of GTMfund Airpod Pros! What you will learn: The concept of building a media channel as a part of every brandBeing overly structured doesn't bring you the best outcomes overtimeNever stop interfacing with your customers as a founder Highlights (2:57) The thinking and execution behind Keyplay (6:06) How to get people to care about your early stage startup (10:28) Adam’s advice to founders building a Media and community arm (13:50) Adam’s pivotal career story (20:44) The importance of the Cofounder relationships (23:30) Not losing track of your customer (27:25) How to get past the 1M mark as a startup (33:30) Gating content is no longer needed in tech (36:30) What's replacing gated content (38:17) Offering a free version of your product will help your company's growth at the earlier stage Quotes "Really lean into the CoFounder relationship at a startup" "In the early stage it's easy for the founder to be deep with the customer, as you get bigger you're less connected to each and every customer" Links and Resources Adam's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elenahutchison/ KeyPlay's Website: https://keyplay.io PeerSignal Website: https://peersignal.org The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The .GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Guest appearance from the one and only Paul Irving again this month as him and Scott discuss the general trends in the macro environment, predictions and paving the path forward for todays economy. They also dive into the asset class comparisons and their latest US Trade Mission trip to HongKong! Don't miss out! P.S. We're officially running a GTMfund giveaway program! Share our media content (GTM podcast or GTM newsletter) on LinkedIn and Twitter, tag us, and you'll be entered to win a pair of GTMfund Airpod Pros! Highlights (0:45) Little Summer Update (2:14) Why the VC landscape is different this year (5:00) Paul’s take on the private and public markets right now (8:44) Scott and Paul’s recap on the US Trade Mission in HongKong last month (13:45) Last months GTM dinners in Toronto and NYC (15:57) A GTMfund PortfolioCompany story / update from Paul (21:00) Expanding on the concept of “flight to quality” (26:00) Whether founders are going to start rethinking their value propositions The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday, discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world.

Elena Hutchison has over 15 years of B2B SaaS experience, including a 10-year run at Customer Experience leader Medallia where she supported the company's growth from Series B through IPO.As Medallia's Chief Strategy Officer, Elena led Product Marketing, Analyst Relations, and PreSales functions, and contributed significantly to the company's M&A and product strategy.Elena has particular expertise in scaling global PreSales functions - she joined Medallia as one of its first Sales Engineers and eventually led the 150-person org.She has also built a reputation as an elite Analyst Relations practitioner, with multiple leading Forrester Waves and Gartner MQs under her belt.Prior to Medallia, Elena spent 5 years in Professional Services and Customer Success roles. (She also earned some phenomenal stories from her days as a political pollster and focus group moderator). P.S. We're officially running a GTMfund giveaway program! Share our media content (GTM podcast or GTM newsletter) on LinkedIn and Twitter, tag us, and you'll be entered to win a pair of GTMfund Airpod Pros! What you will learn Highlights (3:48) How Elena built her way up from Sales engineer to C-Suite at Medallia (7:22) How to fill the gaps when starting a new role (13:10) Elena’s transition from engineering to analyst relations at Medallia (18:24) Defining analyst relations (25:16) Analyzing the concept of “Pay to Play” (30:00) The metrics that matter for analyst relations (31:41) Elena’s biggest mistake sitting at the executive table (35:00) The power of outside mentorship (37:20) The importance of bringing on Sales Engineers early on Quotes “If you’re continuing to learn in a place and the companies investing in you, you’re so much better off staying 90% of the time than you are hopping to another place for a better title” “Having things that force you to do the things that you need to do, always helps you get through them” “The real goal is building an early stage champion” Links and Resources Elena's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elenahutchison/ Elena's Consulting: uprightar.com The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The .GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.

Manny Medina is the CEO and Co-Founder at Outeach. Prior to Outreach, Manny was employee number three on Amazon's AWS team, and led the Microsoft mobile division from launch to $50M in annual revenue. He holds an MBA from Harvard and a Masters in Computer Science from the University of Pennsylvania. What you will learn Manny P.S. We're officially running a GTMfund giveaway program! Share our media content (GTM podcast or GTM newsletter) on LinkedIn and Twitter, tag us, and you'll be entered to win a pair of GTMfund Airpod Pros! Highlights (2:42) Where Manny’s sustained motivation to win comes from (5:14) Manny’s take on AI’s impact on rev tech (9:35) Manny’s take on the competitive landscape with the emergence of AI (19:40) An impactful story that happened to Manny recently came across (27:24) How to maintain a strong company culture as you start to scale (33:35) Manny’s valuable advice to first time founders (35:03) The story of Manny’s first memorable sale (37:08) 2 fundamentals things that have changed in SaaS over the last couple years (40:40) Best tip to founders Quotes “You have to get excited about what’s forward, and once you get excited about what’s forward, the sustaining factor is how many other people you infect with that happiness” “It’s not obsession it’s one step passed obsession - this is what you think about, this how you play, this what you obsess about, this is what you think about on weekends” “We don’t fundamentally believe in just forecasting, it has to be forecasting with an action” “What are the artificacts of culture that will live on past you?” Links and Resources Manny Medina's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/medinism/ Manny Medina's Twitter: https://twitter.com/medinism The GTM Podcast Don’t miss The .GTM Podcast dropping every Tuesday discussing true stories and experiences including trials and tribulations in the Go-To-Market world. And…monthly bonus podcast episodes dropping the first Thursday of every month.