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Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

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Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#51

Post by jzukoff »

chriswilliams wrote: post #30
giffc wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

agreed. It is pretty silly. When one has no experience, one should be willing to do a little more research first and talk to a few more experienced folks. There are many sales & marketing driven software companies. Sometimes it works, sometimes it is a disaster. Personally, I think that the trick is usually about finding the right balance between business, design and engineering, not putting one on a pedestal above t…

Giffc, I agree it's about balance. I'm talking about ONE SPECIFIC time. That's going from $0 in revenue to $50k, without investment. Chris

No..you aren't talking about one specific time..or at least your article isn't. If that were the case than you'd be talking about why salespeople aren't STARTING companies rather than asking why they aren't RUNNING companies.

Without a talented engineering team, a product won't be able to change or adapt to customers changing needs and opinions.

Sure you can sell a product that isn't fully developed, and outsource your engineering but in all likelihood you're going to wind up with a clusterfuck of a codebase and so much technical debt that your customers aren't ever going to see anything more than the crappy first iteration of a product.

This is all just so silly. By your logic all that is important is that you have salespeople that can sell anything, including a crap product. Is that really how you want to drive a company? Salespeople would have an easier time selling a well engineered and functioning product no?

Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#52

Post by jzukoff »

abc_lisper wrote: post #8

Yeah. Well, can all sales people run businesses? Let's start from the basic questions: 1. How do you know X is more difficult than Y technically. How do you trust somebody who says X or Y? Should they sell you the idea because, ya know, you are a sales person? 2. What makes a sales person? Ability to sell a product A? Is selling A different from B? Do you specialize in A? How are you different from somebody who too c…

Your 4th point is key here and its something the author just doesn't seem to understand..

Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#53

Post by craigching »

chriswilliams wrote: post #33
thetrumanshow wrote: post #21

It is a fairly recent development that the tech industry has acquired ways to make building a v1.0 easier. And the salespeople are looking around now, clearly able to tell the extent to which you can execute v1.0 with C-Level talent, and wondering why so many companies are still run by software people. The answer I believe is: because this all used to be much harder, and you had to rely on your engineers to pull you…

100% Agree. Chris

>> The pendulum is swinging back from technical implementation, back through design, and the power is returning to sales and marketing, IMO.

> !00% Agree.

Disagree 100%. No matter the "pendulum" there are different motivations from sales to marketing to engineering and there is no one answer. Anyone who says "sales is the answer" is either in a very specialized software market or is selling snake oil. Any good sales person knows this. Even average sales people know this. Bad salespeople apparently don't.

Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#54

Post by thetrumanshow »

craigching wrote: post #53
chriswilliams wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100% Agree. Chris

>> The pendulum is swinging back from technical implementation, back through design, and the power is returning to sales and marketing, IMO. > !00% Agree. Disagree 100%. No matter the "pendulum" there are different motivations from sales to marketing to engineering and there is no one answer. Anyone who says "sales is the answer" is either in a very specialized software market or is selling snake oil. Any good sales…

"Sales Cures All." --Mark Cuban.

http://blogmaverick.com/2008/03/09/my-rules-for-startups/

Edit: I shouldn't have pulled that card. Apologies. I'm not helping matters. There's already way too much vitrol going on in this thread.

Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#55

Post by nbouscal »

chriswilliams wrote: post #29
nbouscal wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. Salespeople fundamentally do not create. For those of us who are in technology not to build a 'successful' company or pad our bank accounts, but rather to create new things, none of what this guy is talking about really has any relevance.

Disagree. I have bills to pay, and this means selling.

I have bills to pay too, but I try very hard to prevent them from being the motivating factor in my life. If I am living to pay my bills, then I am living my life in a wrong fashion. Creation is one of the most important and fulfilling activities that I know. Pursuing that activity for the sole purpose of paying bills seems to me such a great perversion that I would rather not create at all. Being paid for my work is fine and good, but working only for the sake of being paid? No. I would rather be poor.

(I imagine that this may be perceived as an extreme stance. To that I can only say: “It is no measure of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” - Jiddu Krishnamurti)

Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#56

Post by craigching »

thetrumanshow wrote: post #54
craigching wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The pendulum is swinging back from technical implementation, back through design, and the power is returning to sales and marketing, IMO. > !00% Agree. Disagree 100%. No matter the "pendulum" there are different motivations from sales to marketing to engineering and there is no one answer. Anyone who says "sales is the answer" is either in a very specialized software market or is selling snake oil. Any good sales…

"Sales Cures All." --Mark Cuban. http://blogmaverick.com/2008/03/09/my-rules-for-startups/ Edit: I shouldn't have pulled that card. Apologies. I'm not helping matters. There's already way too much vitrol going on in this thread.

I don't think you should apologize. Sales does cure all. If your sales people can sell a thirsty man water living next to a fresh water lake, kudos, they're great sales people! But software is not that easily sold (at least not since the 90's, or not since the early days of iOS in the consumer market).

But the problem is that "sales as strategy" as posed by the OP is most likely short-sighted due to "sales person motivations" , i.e. sales this quarter that affect my bottom line. These types of sales tend to drive one customer's needs versus the customer base. Not always, but that's where product management and engineering can provide a valuable perspective.

And all of that depends on your targets. If 400K is big money for you, go for it. But 400k is probably only big in the context of one or two people.

Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#57

Post by richardjordan »

chriswilliams wrote: post #27
richardjordan wrote: post #14

We tried this before, as an industry. It didn't work. There's a reason investors pattern match away from sales people as founder & CEO of a startup. Sales people are often too good at selling themselves and not so good at getting product out the door. Selling ahead of the curve right up until the point you've burned your market with missed ship dates. Having done both sales (taken product to market leading position f…

Hey Richard, I disagree. "Lean startup" (I've only skimmed, not read) is all about teaching coders to sell. Correct me if I'm wrong, no code should be written unless there is market demand. The challenge is not selling ONCE you have a solid product, it's going from NOTHING to something. Chris

I've read Lean Startup and followed ER's work since he was doing the start up lessons learned blog. However he doesn't advocate salespersons as founders and CEOs, he advocates for a set of principles and practices which allow startup founders to test products in the market. This isn't the same thing.

Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#58

Post by kozikow »

I agree with some of things you say, but with some don't. I agree with the fact that one should verify that there is market for his idea, but you don't need to have sales people for this.

Good engineers want to avoid working at companies, where engineering department is not on the top - on example they need to explain things, which shouldn't need explanation, or their boss see them as cost centre, not a profit centre and seeks to replace them by cheaper alternative. If you don't have good engineers, innovation of your product stales and someone comes to steal your market, no matter how awesome sales people you have.

You mention that sales people are more important in reaching phase 1.0 in B2B companies, in getting these first 1000 consumers. Let's get two hypothetical examples: - Company A, which creates bad product, but sales manage to sell it to 1000 consumers. - Company B, which creates awesome product, but their are no good sales behind, so it is gaining first customers very slowly. Then over the time first customers of company B will tell their friends that product is awesome and it will eventually reach 1000 customers and keep increasing exponentially (these new customers will bring their friends and post excellent reviews online). It is run by good engineers so they will analyse and listen to their users and keep making product better. On the other hand, company A will get terrible reputation, these 1000 customers will realize shortcomings in the product and stop using it.

Fact that you created successful company being a sales person doesn't mean that it is better to have companies run by sales people. One example doesn't make it for general rule. Do you know a company run by engineers executing the same idea to do the comparison?

You cite the fact that majority of companies fail because of lack of users instead of lack of ability to create a product. It doesn't mean that their failure wasn't caused by bad product - they could created something that worked, but wasn't good enough. This fact doesn't mean that they would succeed if they would have rock-star sales people on the board. Some ideas are just not fit for market and even placing hundreds of sales people doing the calls won't help.

Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#59

Post by hluska »

lukethomas wrote: post #41
hluska wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First, if you haven't read it, how do you know what it's about?? Second, did you skim over anything about the build-measure-learn loop? If so, let's say that you have an idea, build a first (completely fake) version, and get it in front of people. The next step would be to build something that works, right? If you're completely non-technical, how do you find people to take you to that step (and to do it elegantly eno…

The point is that unless someone is paying your bills, you need to charge from the very beginning. It's supply/demand equation - your goal from the beginning should be to determine the demand, make sales, and fill the need with your offering.

I'm aware of that.

I just can't imagine how a wholly non-technical salesperson could go from validating there is a demand to actually fulfilling the demand without either finding a technical co-founder, becoming technical or else winning the freelance lottery.

Re: Why Aren't Salespeople Running Software Companies?

#60

Post by keppy »

richardjordan wrote: post #14

We tried this before, as an industry. It didn't work. There's a reason investors pattern match away from sales people as founder & CEO of a startup. Sales people are often too good at selling themselves and not so good at getting product out the door. Selling ahead of the curve right up until the point you've burned your market with missed ship dates. Having done both sales (taken product to market leading position f…

I saw this post on twitter; logged in here to make sure these words were spoken.
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