Case Studies

Overview

This case study explores the successful partnership between Predictable Revenue and Breakthrough, focusing on their journey from initial engagement to fruitful partnership. Key insights are drawn from a conversation involving Erin Blaha, Senior Director of Marketing at Breakthrough, and Collin Stewart, Founder & CEO of Predictable Revenue.

The Challenge

Before partnering with Predictable Revenue, Breakthrough managed new business development internally, without a specialized sales development representative (SDR) function. Their sales team handled end-to-end sales cycles, which, while effective, posed challenges in scaling lead generation and top-of-funnel activities. 

“The experience of our Account Executives has been great. In the beginning we were hesitant because we don’t have internal SDRs and we were worried about how they were going to explain what our product is,” says Blaha.

Handing over the outbound responsibilities to a new crew seemed risky. The breakthrough team had honed their internal processes, refined messaging, and could easily answer questions about how their software worked.  Could an external team get up to speed fast enough? Could they connect with the right buyers? And could they fit into our well-established processes? In short, yes, we could.

“The meetings are high quality, good-fit opportunities. It makes us feel confident that something is always coming in – even if website leads or other sources are a little slower, we know we’ll have a handful of quality meetings from the Predictable Revenue team. Every Friday, we pull a list of opportunities, and it makes my team and me confident that something’s always happening.”

The Solution

Breakthrough’s engagement with Predictable Revenue began mid-fiscal year, introduced by their new president with prior experience with our methodologies. The objective was to boost top-of-the-funnel lead generation, complementing the internal sales team’s efforts with external cold calling and prospecting expertise.

Onboarding and Implementation

The onboarding process with Predictable Revenue was efficient and well-organized. The Breakthrough team equipped Predictable Revenue with a wealth of resources, ensuring a comprehensive understanding of their innovative product – Fuel Recovery. Their solution is making a significant impact in the transportation industry and Predictable Revenue’s MarketFit process helped both teams clarify the nuance required to build the target lists, build the messaging, and create the cold call scripts.

“The focus on messaging has been the biggest thing. The Predictable Revenue team found that being really direct and concise, with a focus on the benefits has worked the best,” says Blaha.  

 Results

The partnership yielded tangible results:

– Multiple closed won deals.
– Notable increase in active sales pipeline.
– 101 meetings booked.

While the quantity of leads was slightly lower than initial KPIs, the quality of meetings and prospects was high, aligning with Breakthrough’s focus on quality over quantity.

“This has had a positive impact on our pipeline. The quality of the meetings we are getting are really high,” says Blaha. “It’s a no-brainer to keep the engagement going.”

Impact on Breakthrough

For Erin Blaha, the partnership provided a reliable stream of leads and a sense of confidence in ongoing lead-generation efforts. The Predictable Revenue team’s consistent work meant that even during slower periods for other lead generation channels, quality leads were being funneled to their sales team.

Experience with Predictable Revenue’s Team

Breakthrough’s interactions with Predictable Revenue were overwhelmingly positive. Despite initial hesitations, the sales team found value in the additional opportunities provided. Predictable Revenue’s willingness to adjust and refine strategies, particularly in messaging, played a key role in overcoming initial challenges.

Advice for Potential Clients

Erin Blaha advises future clients of Predictable Revenue to:

– Plan for smooth integration into current operations.
– Provide comprehensive onboarding materials.
– Be open to different approaches in sales and lead generation processes.

Conclusion

The partnership between Predictable Revenue and Breakthrough illustrates the power of strategic collaboration and adaptability in lead generation. By effectively complementing Breakthrough’s internal efforts, Predictable Revenue demonstrated its capability to enhance lead generation, streamline the sales process, and contribute significantly to the client’s growth trajectory.

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David Bourbonnière is the CEO and Founder of FLiiP, a business software for gyms, fitness studios, and training centers. When we first met David, he was managing his sales team, building a pretty good outbound pipeline, and managing the million other things a founder/CEO has to do.

He recognized that what got him there wasn’t going to get him to his next revenue goal, so he was looking for a way to build a strong process around his outbound engine.

He was given our book, Predictable Revenue, by his mentor Dan Martell and was curious to see how we could help. While they were achieving some pretty impressive results manually, they wanted to build something that could scale and enable them to really ramp up hiring in the next 2 years.

David decided to work with our sales development coaching team because he had some big goals to hit and wanted our guidance to ensure they didn’t get thrown off track by any roadblocks.

Our team did a deep dive into their ICP, current process and tool stack, and goals for the next 24 months. We reworked Fliip’s sales development playbook around a style that would enable them to hit the targets they needed; this included:

  • Added clarity to their ICP
  • Reworking their core messaging
  • Implement new sequences
  • Built new call scripts
  • Built new core messaging
  • Created an objection-handling process
  • Created a process for hiring and onboarding new SDRs

The messaging deep dive resulted in a better understanding of their ideal customer profile, which helped create better sequences and resulted in an improvement to their overall prospect conversion ratio.

“I’m often disappointed by the service I receive from partners we work with, companies who promise the world and don’t deliver. Predictable Revenue was the opposite.” – David Bourbonnière

On the hiring front, with new job descriptions and a standardized interview process, David hired a strong SDR and manager. The first SDR is already ramped up and productive, and they’re on their way to hiring a second.

David says the new job description has made a big difference in the quality of candidates, and they feel well-positioned to attract the right person for the role.

I’m really confident in our system now that we could hire more SDRs and meet our goals within a few weeks.

Our team worked with David to establish a hiring process for new SDRs. Our coaches sat in on interviews with potential candidates, conducted role-play exercises, and helped design the team structure and compensation plan.

The results speak for themselves; with the new processes, tools, and messaging, the FLiiP team booked 45 demos in just two months. This represents $675k in pipeline. Most importantly, their team now has the systems in place to repeat and scale that success, generating predictable revenue month after month.

After working with the Predictable Revenue coaches, David feels confident in their outbound systems and can’t wait to grow the team. Already their outbound function has grown from just the CEO to an SDR, sales manager, and a second SDR soon to be hired.

We’ll leave David the final word:

I’m often disappointed by the service I receive from partners we work with, companies who promise the world and don’t deliver. Predictable Revenue was the opposite. This was the best investment I could have made in our outbound systems.

Better understanding of their ICP
Improved prospect conversion ratio
Strong hires for their sales development team

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McKay Lasko is the Director of Sales at SaltyCloud, a cybersecurity company that helps organizations automate the governance, risk, and compliance assessment lifecycle to achieve continuous risk visibility at scale. They had found product market fit in the higher education space and wanted to quickly onboard an SDR so they had time to train them up before the next buying window opened up. They needed to move quickly but didn’t have an internal recruiting team or a strong process developed (yet) for hiring new SDRs. 

McKay knew from previous experience at another company that the hiring process could take up to 10-15 hours per candidate even when supported by a recruiting team. In a previous role, he had typically interviewed 15+ people to fill each role, spending 2-3 hours on the hiring process per week, sometimes more.

Hiring the wrong SDR would lead to lost time and resources, especially if that rep needed to be replaced. The cost to replace an AE at McKay’s previous organization was equal to one year’s salary + commission and that was not a mistake that SaltyCloud wanted to make. 

Additionally, this was their first SDR hire so it was especially important because they wanted this person to be a trendsetter and leader for future SDRs.

How We Helped

Our SDR Hiring Service took the bulk of the blocking and tackling off of McKay’s plate, allowing him to focus on building the early infrastructure (tech, tools, and messaging) that the SDR would need once they were onboarded. McKay shared his goals and what he was looking for in a candidate with our team. We ran a large pool of candidates through our SDR hiring process, and McKay hired one from the first 3 people we introduced him to. 

“A resume and LinkedIn can only tell you so much,” McKay says. “The PR process helped me get a much deeper understanding of what each candidate was looking for.”

The Result

Of those three interviews, one candidate stood out above the rest. “He was so well qualified in so many areas,” McKay says. “In terms of his experience and mentality, he’s as good as we could have hoped to get.”

Not only did the candidate’s professionalism stand out, but he also had previous SDR experience in the security field, which was an added bonus they hadn’t expected to find. This experience means McKay won’t have to invest as much time in training the new hire.

“In two weeks, I’ll be spending an hour a week with him. For other candidates, I’d have to spend four hours a day to be confident.” As a result, McKay can invest more time with the next hire because the new sales rep will already be performing outreach independently. 

Best of all, the search for an SDR went quickly. “Having to only look at 10 resumes and interview three people, the hiring time was very good. If we were still searching for an SDR, all our pipeline plans would be behind schedule because I would have had to do it myself.” 

As for finding the right candidate, McKay says that although he may have found someone for the role without Predictable Revenue’s help, that person wouldn’t have been as uniquely qualified. “I never would have found him because I wouldn’t have posted in those places.”

Conclusion

Our SDR Hiring Service was able to help McKay find an ideal fit candidate for SaltyCloud in just three interviews. Already, McKay is making plans for the new SDR to mentor future reps as the team continues to grow. “I don’t know what you’d call a perfect hire, but he’s very close.”

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Ben Howden is the Director of Growth for the APAC Region at TEAM Software, a leading software company offering workforce management services. As the APAC region scaled, Ben was looking for solid training for the sales team and decided to partner with Predictable Revenue through our Outbound Success Coaching.

Before Predictable Revenue

Before working with Predictable Revenue, the outbound sales team at TEAM Software consisted of two account executives and one newly hired sales development rep (SDR).

Although revenue growth was solid, Ben was looking to take sales to a new level and bring more leads into the funnel, and to do that; he needed to refine and improve their outbound model.

The Problem

The outbound sales team had a loosely defined model in place, but Ben wanted to ensure the team followed industry best practices and set themselves up with a platform for success. They needed a solid framework to build the SDR function around. Without a playbook to work from, it was challenging to train and onboard new SDRs and ramp up quckly

In addition, Ben was hoping to upskill the existing sales team members and ensure everyone was following best practices for outbound. 

Our Solution

Our Outbound Success Coaching helped TEAM Software document a comprehensive sales playbook. Considering their industry, personas, and key buyers, we created a training framework completely tailored to their specific needs.

“The customization of the program was excellent,” Ben says. “Although there’s a clear framework to follow, it didn’t feel like a “one size fits all” approach.”

The Result

With the playbook in hand, Ben and his team now have a resource they can refer back to as they build out their SDR function. The outbound sales team has the confidence to create new cadences faster, use data to optimize future cadences and follow best practices. 

“Having the framework to build off allows us to create structured cadences faster and get more out the door,” Ben says, “speed is so important for outbound success.”

Since the coaching engagement, TEAM Software’s outbound campaigns have been going well, with seven qualified opportunities acquired in one month. “It was a positive experience all around,” Ben says.

Conclusion

Our coaching support helped TEAM Software build a customized outbound sales framework they can use to tighten their sales process, drive more leads, and train new SDRs. We also helped establish a strong foundation for them to build on.

Although their sales team had seen some success, they lacked a clearly defined outbound process. Creating a sales playbook ensures the team follows best practices as they scale.

Ben says they plan on investing more time to expand the playbook as the company grows, but for now, he feels confident using it as a model. Their new outbound cadences have a higher response rate, and they’re hoping to continue this positive momentum.

100% increase in SQLs from over 6 months

  Confidence to create new cadences faster and follow best practices

Their outbound cadences have a higher response rate

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Joe Savoia is the Director of Enterprise Sales at Pagely, a software company providing managed WordPress services.

Before Predictable Revenue

Before engaging with Predictable Revenue, the sales team at Pagely consisted of Joe, a quota carrying AE who also handled inbound leads, and a customer success rep. 

The Problem

When Joe joined Pagely, their growth was stagnant and net new business was reliant on inbound sales. In a slow month with no inbound leads, there were no new customers. This unreliable stream of opportunities led Joe to reach out to Predictable Revenue; he’d seen the outbound model work at other companies, and knew it could be effective at Pagely. 

Joe had experience in outbound sales and was familiar with the Predictable Revenue book. He began to map out what a similar system might look like at Pagely. Once that was complete, he wanted an outside analysis of the way things were set up to see if there was any room for improvement.

Our Solution

We engaged with Joe and Pagely for a two month Outbound Consultation, providing feedback on their messaging, SDR model, and key metrics to track. 

Our coaches helped Pagely tweak their messaging to make it shorter and less salesly. We also helped build more effective outbound sales sequences and a targeted ideal customer profile (ICP). Lastly, we provided guidance on what day to day tasks could be outsourced and recommended tools to help the team do so.

The Result

As a result of the engagement with Predictable Revenue, Joe has been able to train and onboard six SDRs so far, with plans to grow in the future. Pagely now has consistent outbound opportunities coming in the door. After starting from $0, they’ve since reached up to $20,000 in recurring revenue per month. The next focus is making that revenue more predictable month to month.

The biggest takeaway for Joe was validation that they’re on the right track. After the engagement with Predictable Revenue, the team at Pagely can be confident that they’re setting realistic goals and feel good hiring more SDRs. 

They have a proven system for how to run the team, how to train people, and how to grow in the future. “All of that was informed by PR,” Joe says, “whereas before, I was just guessing.” 

Conclusion

The consulting engagement with Predictable Revenue helped Pagely set up a strong foundation for their outbound sales function. Our coaches helped them understand the most effective way to do outbound for their company, so they can maximize their return on investment for each SDR hired.

Joe and the outbound sales team now feel confident asking their CEO for additional SDR hires. They have clear expectations of what they need to grow, and are on track to reach more predictable, scalable revenue.

$20,000

in recurring revenue per month

They have a proven system for how to run the team, how to train people,

and how to grow in the future.

They now feel confident asking their CEO

for additional SDR hires.

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