Something changed. I don’t know what. I don’t know when. But it changed. If you’re a bootstrapped founder and have achieved product market fit, then you’re probably thinking it’s time to get back to innovating on your product, get the hired gun in and make your first Sales hire. If you’re angel or VC-backed you may well be thinking the … Read More
At The Right Five, we deliver candidates for interview that we know have the skills required to succeed as the first Sales hire in a B2B tech startup. We call them Pathfinders. All you have to do is choose the one that “fits best” (we’ll come back to that). These candidates have the requisite all round sales and marketing skills … Read More
You did it. You hired your first salesperson. Whether to get yourself out of the frontline of Sales or, maybe, to get the business more proactive in its go to market, you’ve done it. Now you can focus on other things. Maybe, more fulfilling things. Sure, you’ll still have to ride shotgun on some sales calls but the future is … Read More
Last week we highlighted how B2B tech founders can deal with the Great Resignation. This week we’re taking a look at the Great Layoff and what that means for our B2B tech founder. While the Great Resignation requires a degree of thoughtfulness in terms of how to compete given that dynamic, the Great Layoff presents opportunity albeit with a note … Read More
…or as Gary Vaynerchuk said, “what about the great ‘not even applying in the first place’?” The seeds of the “great resignation” go back several years and it was Texas A&M’s Anthony Klotz who gave it a name back in 2019. A 2021 Microsoft survey of over 30,000 workers showed 41% were considering quitting their job with that number rising … Read More
Overview and Demo Video:- Transcript:- Many B2B tech founders struggle to successfully make their first sales hire. This is largely because of a mismatch between what they think they need and what they actually need to get them from startup to scale-up. As an example, founders often lean towards salespeople with the best rolodex, or who are the most extroverted, … Read More
Regular readers will recall that our product development was outsourced to a Ukrainian firm called Go Wombat. We started the design phase of the project in December 2021 and moved into the development phase at the beginning of February. The goal was to complete the project by end of March, 2022. Then the invasion of Ukraine happened (something we’ve covered … Read More
If you’re a candidate and have been asked to take The Right Five Pathfinder assessment you may be wondering what it’s all about, what’s in it for you and what we do with your data. Let’s spend a moment talking about one of the major challenges faced by B2B tech startups – getting their first Sales hire right. Most founders … Read More
My thanks to ex-colleague Greg Head for highlighting the often missing simple startup math in startup investor pre-pitches. He’s highlighting companies that are (generally) pre-revenue but who are articulating making it big without a supporting plan. On the valuation curve, he’s talking about businesses effectively at time zero and asking the questions: How are you going to get your first … Read More
If you’re a B2B tech founder with previous marketing experience then you’ll be well aware of the costs associated with creating awareness in your business and turning that awareness into leads. It’s certainly not unusual for a steady-state cost per lead to be north of $50 and significantly more in highly competitive sectors. And that’s steady-state. Figuring out how to … Read More
