socalTECH

JULY 18, 2019

Santa Monica-based Cornerstone OnDemand , which provides cloud-based learning and talent management tools, has linked up with a sales training company, Sandler Training, on a new sales training subscription, the two said today. Financial details of the partnership were not announced. READ MORE>>.

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Cornerstone OnDemand Training Sales Santa Monica 113

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 24, 2022

As a business consultant and angel investor, I often ask for your own assessment of marketing ROI , or customer acquisition cost (CAC). Mr. Everhart distills his leadership insights from many decades in one of the largest business-to-business marketing agencies, working with companies across the country.

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Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 13, 2020

Having the best solution is a good start these days, but a solution alone is no longer enough to keep customer attention and loyalty. The challenge is to transform and hardwire your entire team to think in these terms, rather than the default focus on distinct towers of product quality, closing the sale, or fixing a complaint.

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 30, 2022

Today’s customers are much more in control of their buying decision, as they have more choices and more information than ever before. Bloom’s classic book, “ The New Experts: Win Today's Newly Empowered Customers.” This is a key moment where your customer acquisition costs go way down, and your profits go way up.

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Customer Custom Startup Course 146

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 7, 2014

I spend a lot of time with startups and thus hear many companies talk about their approach to sales and their interactions with customers. From these meetings you can really tell the leaders that care deeply about their customers and those the look down on them. You’d be very wrong. You can’t.

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Customer Custom Venture Capital Software Review 341

socalTECH

APRIL 25, 2018

Los Angeles-based TaskUs , which provides outsourced customer support and other back-end support for technology companies, said today that it has named Jarrod Johnson as Chief Customer Officer. Johnson was previously SVP of Sales at TaskUs, and will be based in the company's Dallas offices.

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Customer Custom Outsource IBM 127

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 15, 2023

Entrepreneurs have always believed that their product or service must show real value to customers, but today the smart ones are even able to make their marketing valuable. Now customers seek out people who are willing and able to add value, with expertise and insight, even before they have a product. The key is consistency.

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Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 23, 2013

Every sales organization with more than a handful of reps or that is across multiple offices or time zones would benefit from having a sales methodology. I’ve been writing a series on a simple methodology that we used at my first enterprise software company. This solves the customer question, “Why Buy Anything?”.

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Sales Customer Custom Examples 328

Berkonomics

JANUARY 12, 2023

Some types of businesses generate more and more recurring revenues over time, often growing to a size where recurring revenues pay all of the overhead of the company – an enviable position. There is a phenomenon I have observed time after time with mature companies receiving over 75% of their revenues from recurring sources.

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TechCrunch LA

OCTOBER 27, 2020

Postmates is now rolling out what could be the biggest update to the company’s service in a long time — adding a retail option for users to shop local stores and for local merchants to set up a virtual on-demand storefront in the app. That could have an impact on retail sales that were already projected to be dismal.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 23, 2021

Yet, as a business consultant, I often find minimal focus on improving employee engagement and assessing their customer-facing performance. For example, I commonly see metrics to keep track of revenue per employee, overtime, and absenteeism, but I don’t often see measures of overall customer satisfaction with individual employees.

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Customer Custom Technical Review Metrics 147

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 20, 2023

Instead, they need to validate a customer problem and real market need first. Don’t create solutions looking for a problem , since investors ignore these, and customers other than early adopters will be hard to find. I say again, customers buy solutions, not technology. Look for customer willingness and ability to pay.

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Customer Custom Social Media Technology 110

socalTECH

DECEMBER 7, 2017

Santa Monica-based Cornerstone OnDemand , which develops human capital management and employee learning software, has cut its sales head count, and shuffled its sales and services organizations, the company said late Wednesday.

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Cornerstone OnDemand Sales Santa Monica IBM 100

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 9, 2022

Most businesses spend big money testing their brand logo, catchy marketing phrases, and demographics, but spend little time training and validating that their employees can and do deliver exceptional experiences to their customers. Keep your team happy to create engaged customers. Build relationships and stop surveying customers.

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Customer Custom Services Training 123

TechEmpower

MARCH 4, 2024

Key Functions with High Impact Generative AI is revolutionizing sales by enabling dynamic pricing and personalized customer interactions, boosting conversion rates and customer satisfaction. Post-sale, AI analyzes customer data to improve service and loyalty, making it a cornerstone of modern sales methodologies.

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Generative AI TechEmpower CTO Hire Outsource Development 295

socalTECH

AUGUST 21, 2018

Los Angeles-based Postie , the machine-learning-meets-diirect-mail startup backed by Bonfire Ventures and Crosscut Ventures, said today that it has named Zev Gollender as the company's Head of Sales. Gollender was most recently Vice President of Media Sales at Taboola, and also has served at Adiant and AOL.

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Artificial Inteligence Sales Los Angeles Acquisition 100

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 17, 2013

In my first enterprise software company we developed a methodology for sales that we called PUCCKA. Having a methodology instead of just going on random sales visits helped force a bit of rigor and honesty amongst team members about how well or not we thought we were doing. ” It’s a reason a company would buy.

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Sales Slides Startup Customer 367

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 19, 2021

In fact, only 100 of the 10,000 multimillion-dollar consumer companies around the world can claim to be an “apostle brand” – one that inspires enduring trust, loyalty, and endorsement. The challenge of every startup is finding that balance between solving a real problem today, and giving customers the courage to make a leap forward.

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Company Companies Startup Customer 152

socalTECH

MARCH 14, 2018

As part of our sponsor relationship with the conference, we're running a series of interviews with speakers from the conference about their experience in the area of recurring revenues, customer service, and similar topics. What's the biggest lesson you've learned about retaining and keeping your customers using the subscription model?

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Customer Custom Conference Social Media 166

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 9, 2013

This is final part of a series that describes a sales methodology for technology companies or frankly many other types of companies, too. We developed this at our first company and called it PUCCKA – the overall methodology is described here. Well think of it this way – you have your sales process.

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Customer Custom Marketing Newsletter 324

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 17, 2013

One of the questions I’m most often asked by CEOs is how to hire sales people. I’ve also written extensively on sales and on which sales execs to hire and how to think about the different kinds of sales leaders. Clearly in an enterprise customer this is unlikely. Call high, and get passed down or; B.

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Sales Technical Review Organization Case Study 375

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 22, 2021

As I talk to many of you in my role as business advisor, I still often hear the concern for maximum return to the business and stakeholders, more than a passion for sustainably enriching the lives of your customers and team. This applies to your own team, as well as customers. Make every customer experience memorable.

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Customer Custom Satisfaction Metrics 114

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 11, 2020

They forget that adapting their company and themselves as their customers evolve is the key to long-term survival. Think of Blockbuster and Toys ‘R’ Us , both of whom missed customer changes and the move to online. Create an overt strategy to react to emerging customer trends. Remember when you were a startup?

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Customer Custom Examples IBM 143

TechCrunch LA

MAY 3, 2022

The company Winters was working for sponsored her MBA to Harvard Business School, and it was there that she came up with the idea for Upgrade. “I The company, which raised $1.7 The company makes money on the wig and hair sales and saw revenue triple over the past year. Upgrade founder and CEO Britney Winters.

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Tool Customer Custom Marketing 179

Berkonomics

JANUARY 9, 2020

One of your employees is approached by an employee of a customer or of a supplier, stating that “It sure would be great to work in your company.” The rule should be one that includes only one “out”: if a person resigns from the position with the stake-holding company, then you will be happy to talk about a position.

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Customer Custom Innocal Email 156

socalTECH

MAY 16, 2019

For our interview this morning, we caught up with Isaac Garcia , a serial entrepreneur who previously founded and sold his last company, Central Desktop, and now is working on a new startup, Sales Insider. What is Sales Insider? Isaac Garcia: Sales Insider is a talent marketplace for hiring software sales reps.

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Sales Startup Software Marketing 133

socalTECH

MAY 23, 2018

Playa Vista-based Appetize , which develops modern, tablet- and handheld-based point of sale (POS) systems, has added a number of high profile customers, and says it has seen record growth this year. The company's point-of-sale terminals and software are a significant upgrade from legacy point-of-sale terminals.

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Customer Custom Sales Education 100

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 5, 2011

Specifically what is often not in the DNA of founders are sales skills. Nor do they exist in the investors of early-stage companies. The result is a lack of knowledge of the process and of sales people themselves. I had never had any sales training so everything we did for the first couple of years was instinctual.

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Sales Pricing Startup Customer 316

TechCrunch LA

MARCH 17, 2021

The Los Angeles-based company has a new residential solar plus energy storage program for homeowners in Queens that’s going to be rolled out in partnership with ConEd. It’s a project that will create solar-powered home batteries for eligible ConEd customers.

Southern California 237

Southern California Company Companies Glendale 237

socalTECH

OCTOBER 6, 2020

Los Angeles-based J2 GLobal , which owns a diverse range of Internet information and services companies, announced this morning that it has acquired three more companies, and--unusually--also has divested one. Financial details of the acquisitions and sale were not announced by the company. READ MORE>>.

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socalTECH

JULY 24, 2014

Southern California has a growing number of companies in the customer relationship management area, including a fairly new company in the area, Pipeliner CRM (www.pipelinersales.com). We spoke with Nikolaus Kimla , the CEO of Pipeliner CRM, to learn more about the company, its move here, and its software.

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Sales Startup Software Customer 229

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 31, 2010

This is part of my ongoing Sales & Marketing Series. In the first part of this post I talked about how sales in a startup is often evangelical , requires as consultative sale and needs constant adjustments based on customer feedback. We had 4 or 5 sales reps that had been around since the early days.

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Sales Newsletter Technical Review Activity 286

socalTECH

APRIL 8, 2020

Irvine-based Digital Motors says it is offering up the ability to add online auotmotive sales in 24 hours to car dealerships, allowing any car dealership to turn their website into an online store.

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Sales Tool Customer Custom 113

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 22, 2020

Entrepreneurs have always believed that their product or service must show real value to customers, but today the smart ones are even able to make their marketing valuable. Now customers seek out people who are willing and able to add value, with expertise and insight, even before they have a product. The key is consistency.

Customer 127

Customer Custom Marketing Content 127

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2010

A while back I wrote a bunch of posts on Sales & Marketing and have been meaning to get back to that theme for a while. Even if you don’t have “direct&# sales I would tell you that “everything is a sale&# including fund raising, hiring, getting press and doing business development. You learn by asking.

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Sales Startup Technical Review Customer 346

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 3, 2010

I’d like to talk about Crocodile Salesmen in 3 scenarios: 1) when YOU are selling (or someone on your team), 2) when you are trying to recruit a sales person. But how to apply “listening&# in a sales meeting? Let’s assume you run a Customer Support software company. I still do this sometimes, too.

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Sales Startup Venture Capital Customer 314

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 21, 2013

So when I meet with GRP portfolio companies that do enterprise sales I try to emphasize the following: 1. This might mean helping customers buy traffic, arb’ing deals, helping with RTB pricing or trading, etc. Minimize Any Custom Work That Will Not Feed Back Into Your R&D. Protect Your Intellectual Property.

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Software Review Software Services Company 321