We’re 200 Episodes Old!

HUMBLE BEGINNINGS

It’s hard to believe that in just 3 short years, the Predictable Revenue podcast has managed to amass 200 episodes and close to the same number of guests. The first episode was of comically low quality: production quality, that is – Collin is quick to point out that the content and his guest were not to blame.

Collin recorded this first episode of the podcast in the busy lobby of a conference center somewhere in the US, wearing the fatigue of a long few days of networking and a (possibly unwashed) t-shirt. He didn’t have the fancy mic and preamp and headphone setup you see on the show now. He might as well have been using headphones he was given on an Air Canada Jazz flight for all the noise in the recording. But, in spite of his technological shortcomings, Collin was excited. He’d organized an interview with Zach Barney, Director of Sales at Teem. The two sales aficionados dissected the always entertaining world of spiffs – what works, what doesn’t, and how to keep it fresh.

Listen to Episode 1: Rallying the troops: How to effectively spiff your SDRs with Zach Barney.

TOP 3 MOST VIEWED EPISODES

The first episode Collin and Sarah reflected on from the most-viewed list was an old Collin Stewart Special. Collin roped in David Mordzynski, Enterprise Marketing Strategist at  Demandbase, to chat about a polarizing topic in the world of outbound sales: personalization. David was an up-and-coming sales professional in New York, quickly making a name for himself by developing a scalable-yet-personalized email prospecting method based on info gleaned from a prospect’s LinkedIn profile. While David delineated his strategy Collin, in true Collin fashion, threw playfully contrarian questions back at his guest. And David was a true pioneer – this topic was one that would be revisited time and time again on the podcast, and in all three of the top 3 most viewed episodes.

Listen to our favourite snippet from Episode 11: Personalized Plug N’ Play: Using LinkedIn to Prospect with David Mordzynksi.

The second episode from the most-viewed list was hosted by Collin once again and with a particularly familiar guest, Sarah Hicks. Then a senior SDR at Predictable Revenue, Sarah made her first podcast appearance to discuss a LinkedIn-based personalization strategy, not too dissimilar from that of David Mordzynski, that she used to hit 130% quota without making a single cold call. She walked viewers through finding thought leaders on LinkedIn, using high engagement activity to discover prospects, list building, and personalization based on this activity. Sarah’s camera presence rivalled Collin’s and you could almost see the wave of emotion wash over him as he realized he was standing in the company of true podcaster greatness. 

Listen to our favourite snippet from Episode 135: How to Turn Engaging Activity on LinkedIn into Prospects.

The third and final episode that the two podcast hosts covered from the most-viewed list was Collin’s episode with Tom Abbot, founder of SOCO Sales Training. They discussed Tom’s high-quality, value-providing approach to prospecting through Linkedin that has seen an astounding 10% conversion rate. While this episode is fondly remembered by Collin, and certainly well-loved by podcast listeners and viewers alike, it holds a particular significance for Sarah. 

It was shortly after this episode’s release that Sarah began to moonlight as a freelance copywriter for Predictable Revenue. Before Collin would give her the job, however, Sarah was given a test assignment. She, along with a slew of other applicants, was tasked with converting an episode of the podcast into a blog post. That episode was, you guessed it, this one. The blog posts would be submitted to Collin without the names of the writers so that Collin could make an unbiased decision on who to hire based on the quality of writing, accuracy, and insight alone. So, Sarah pored over every second of the episode and toiled over every word she wrote and Collin picked her assignment out of the bunch in a heartbeat. The jury’s still out on this one, but it was either the fact that she was clearly writing from the perspective of someone with immediate and current knowledge of the topic at hand or the joke she slipped in at the end of her entry about Tom Abbot being funny and handsome that landed her the job.

Listen to our favourite snippet from Episode 144: How to Turn 100 LinkedIn Profiles into 10 Meetings.

MOST INFLUENTIAL EPISODES

The most influential episode for Collin was his interview with Jaimie Buss, VP of North American Sales at Zendesk. Jaimie detailed Zendesk’s in-depth qualification process, and how it enables her to forecast her quarters with razor-sharp accuracy. Razor-sharp accuracy as in forecasting within 1% at $500M ARR. Zendesk uses MEDDPICC, a variation on MEDDIC (a sales qualification criteria comprised of Metrics, Economic buyer, Decision criteria, Decision process, Identify pain, and Champion). This episode changed the way Collin looked at the AE qualification process at Predictable Revenue. As a result, he implemented MEDDIC and was bullish in driving its adoption across the closing team.

Listen to our favourite snippet from Episode 59: How Zendesk Forecasts Revenue within 1% (at a $500M Company).

Sarah’s most influential episode was one she did with Managing Partner at ValueSelling,

Chad Sanderson. In the interview, Chad cuts through the outdated, theory-based “fluff” so often attributed to sales training, and gets down to the nitty-gritty with a raw, no-BS perspective look at what is working, what’s not working, and where there may be opportunities to drive predictable revenue growth through sales optimization. But the prized nugget that Sarah took away from this episode was Chad’s comparison between the buying experiences of b2b and b2c. As Chad so rightly points out, the b2c experience is tailored and streamlined. We get target ads that show us products right up our alley and can purchase them in one click. B2b sales hasn’t worked out how to create such a frictionless buying experience, however. And part of the reason is that as a b2c buyer when clicking on ads, going onto ecommerce websites, or even going on social media where you know you’ll be bombarded with ads, you’ve willingly entered a consumer environment. B2b buyers, when hit with cold emails and cold calls, are not in a consumer environment. This juxtaposition is one that has stuck with Sarah ever since and inspired her to research and experiment with strategies that make the buying experience smoother, more efficient, and less invasive.

Listen to our favourite snippet from Episode 189: How to Keep Your Sales Team From Killing Your Brand & Your Bottom Line.

CONCLUSION

Objections are an inevitability if you’re making cold calls. But with the right mindset, reframe strategy, and pattern interrupts, you can crush 99% of those objections, and the remaining 1% of true, infallible objections won’t be able to dampen your spirits. Take it from a hypnotist/dating coach/neuro-linguistic programming expert/leader – by following this framework for objection handling you can blow your target out of the water.

**For free access to Paul Ross’ complete free training course for you and your team, send an email to paul@speakerpaulross.com with the subject line “free” and tell us one thing you learned from this blog post/podcast episode!**

EDITOR’S NOTES:

The blog posts on the episodes mentioned above:

More cash doesn’t always = more calls

How David Mordzynski Uses LinkedIn Profiles For Tailored Prospecting

How to turn engaging activity on LinkedIn into prospects and personalize at scale with Sarah Hicks

How to turn 100 LinkedIn profiles into 10 meetings with Tom Abbott

$500m MEDDPICC secrets revealed: How Zendesk is able to forecast revenue within 1%

How to Keep Your Sales Team From Killing Your Brand & Your Bottom Line with Chad Sanderson

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