Recently I had the pleasure of interviewing my buddy Max Altschuler, VP of business development at AttorneyFee and previously BD at Udemy. Max is a GTD type of dude.
In this interview we talk about:
How he started a business making American $money$ abroad right out of school before joining education marketplace Udemy
Insight into creating a process to build out the supply side marketplace for Udemy (hint – they leveraged outsourced labor!)
Critical elements to successfully managing a pipeline and the “apology technique“
Ways they compelled teachers to take action on their verbal commitments to teach courses
Advice he’d give anyone whose looking to land a startup job
His new gig at Attorney Fee and what he likes about the business (profitable and bootstrapped …
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</head>&amp;lt;img height=”1″ width=”1″ alt=”” style=”display:none” src=”https://www.facebook.com/tr?id=1391796177709651&amp;amp;amp;ev=NoScript” /&amp;gt;A prominent nemisis of opportunity and value creation is being incompetent at following up with people. I want to share my system for remember to write followup emails.
But first…
I want to deflate the hesitancy around following up with people if they haven’t responded to you.
I don’t care whether we’re talking about doing a business development deal or asking someone cute to meet you for a bebida alcohólica, just because someone doesn’t get back to you doesn’t mean they’re not interested.
Maybe they were going to get back to you, but forgot to respond. Maybe your message got lost in their inbox. Maybe they’re dog got sick and they declared email bankruptcy. …
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There’s a right and a wrong way to cold email a company when you’re unsure who the decision maker is. How you approach this can literally be the difference between getting a deal vs. an onry reply to refrain from contacting the company again…
People ask me this question all the time:
If I don’t know who the decision maker is, is it cool to cold email multiple people who might be the decision maker at the same time?
This is a suboptimal approach.
The first thing that’s important to understand is that people within the same company talk. When you carpet bomb multiple people with a sales email you’re doing a few things:
signaling that you’re not sure who the correct person …
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Recently I had the pleasure of interviewing Ryan Delk, head of Growth/Business Development at GumRoad.
Ryan is a stud. I met him 6 weeks ago and could tell immediately that a) he gets it and b) he’s a doer. He was an early employee at GumRoad and dropped out of college to join the team. In their first year, they’ve raised over 8 millions bucks from Silicon Valley’s finest and seen awesome growth in transactions/users.
In this interview we chat about:
What GumRoad is and how it’s changing the way commerce is done online
What Business Development at GumRoad means (like doing deals with Enimem, Ellie Goulding and other cool peeps)
How a little startup can get deals with major record labels and …
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I recently gave a talk to the Canadian Tech Accelerator on how to find decision makers and get meetings as a startup with limited connections. The Canadian Consulate of New York brings a few select young companies to NYC every 3 months to expose them to the New York Tech ecosystem while they grow their business.
For my efforts, they were kind enough to give me a lifetime supply of maple syrup along with a lock of Gretzky’s hair. Pretty sweet trade eh!
In this talk, I cover:
ways to find a decision maker
how to write cold emails that actually work (warning contains unconventional, non-toolish advice)
exact cold call scripts and strategies
some random “resourceful” tactics I’ve used to open doors that I think …
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This is a sneaky post…
Recently somebody on twitter asked me when they should follow up with someone whose made an email introduction in the deal cycle.
After the first conversation?
Mid deal?
After the deal has closed?
Never? (Really hope you didn’t say never)
First off, if you aren’t following up with someone providing the results and/or a progress report after they’ve made an email introduction change that. It’s important because it signals that you’re grateful making these people more likely to make introductions for you in the future. Also 90% OF PEOPLE DON’T DO THIS which makes you stand out…
The second reason why you should follow up with someone whose made an introduction has implications …
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You’re about to see how to use the “Good Cop Bad Cop” technique to get things done and handle uncomfortable situations.
In business, you’re bound to encounter confrontation which can put a strain on a relationship:
“Hey can you get me that check that was due last month?”
“I noticed that you didn’t link back to us in the integration…would you mind inserting a link there?”
“I’m sorry we’re just not going to be able to build that feature you requested.”
Let’s talk about how you can use good cop bad cop to disarm these situations while minimizing any negative effect on a relationship.
What is the Good Cop Bad Cop Technique?
Let’s lay the foundation: people like doing business with people they like. When …
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This post is about strategies I’ve used to close the deal.
One of the biggest challenges in sales and business development can be inspiring urgency to get a deal done. Just because someone perceives value in your offering, doesn’t mean they’ll make it a priority.
There are a number of tactics I’ve used to push deals through the finish line. Though most of these have been in the context of API partnerships, these strategies can be effective in many situations.
The Press Bait
One way to expedite a conversation is by baiting a prospect with a potential press opportunity. Only do this if you actually plan on doing a press release at some point. Here is an example script that demonstrates more precisely what …
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