AMA: Salesforce Former Vice President, Global Enablement, Roopal Shah on Sales Enablement

May 19, 2020 @ 10:00AM PT

Is there a framework for creating good sales enablement decks for new B2B products or training new sales rep on your product?

Eg: How do you structure it? I can imagine some standard sections such as Competition, Market Problem but are there standard "must haves" section that have worked well.

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

I'm a big fan of Nancy Duarte's work and her book Resonate. It speaks a lot to what a good narrative should be for any presentation. With that said, Enablement is a lot about teaching - so how you present to a customer is not necessarily how you present to a seller. For sellers, I put my teacher hat on and really think about what is it that they want to know about and how do I make the content engaging and interactive enough, that they don't fall asleep. So not quite a framework, but hopeful ...Read More

4,201 Views

2 requests
If you were implementing a B2B Marketing and Sales Enablement program, what are the first 5 assets you would create?

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

Good question - to have to pick is tough but if I must, here are the main things I think every sales rep needs in their bag to be successful:

(1) First Call Deck / Pitch Deck

(2) Competitive Battlecard(s) (including how to place traps / how to arm against competitor's traps - shields/swords type of thing)

(3) Tough Q&A Log with really hard questions that a likely customer is to ask

(4) Value Map(s)

(5) Customer Stories

3,569 Views

3 requests
How do you keep competitive, personas, and market research info up-to-date and moving from product marketing to sales materials?

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

Your CMS (content management system) should have some sort of archiving parameters in place that should remind the PMM team when things get stale. With that said, all the reminders in the world won't matter if people ignore them, so I recommend you also have a "librarian" of sorts manage your content site - whether it's in a sales portal or in another tool, someone who is in charge of managing the site, tracking metrics, and also monitoring / organizing PMM when content needs to be refreshed/arc ...Read More

3,719 Views

2 requests
How does sales enablement change when you go from selling a product to selling a platform?

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

It depends on where you are in the growth journey. If this is a strategy change - in terms of no longer selling a product to selling a platform, it's more about messaging & the art of the possible with a platform. If you're further in the growth journey and have a complex product portfolio, where now you need to layer on a platform message, then it's about really ensuring your AEs have that foundational knowledge down. Regardless, with a platform, I find that (1) it's a more technical sale ...Read More

1,447 Views

1 request
What sales enablement changes do we need to make as we shift focus from selling to SMB and mid-market to selling to enterprise?

Our sales team is used to selling to SMB and mid-market.

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

While there are some common themes regardless fo the segment, there are some unique things down market: - Volume is much higher - reps have a 1000s of accounts versus handfuls so productivity is harder - Value selling is different - most buyers in those segments, especially SMB, won't have time for a full value pitch, so you need different types of quick hit ROI calculators/value messaging for down market - Typically, in mature companies - your enterprise sellers also tend to be more tenured an ...Read More

1,180 Views

1 request
What are your biggest challenges in enabling global sales teams, and how do you overcome them?

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

My biggest challenge is working with all the other groups vying for seller attention and helping them approach it with empathy and working for the greater good, versus what they think is best. But the responsibility here isn't all on them - enablement has a responsibilty to also present the full list of requests and pull cross functional groups together to prioritize them together.

2,196 Views

2 requests
How do you enable sales reps to sell higher priced packages vs your lower priced offerings?

Our lower priced offerings seem to be the biggest competitors of our enterprise packages.

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

Value selling is a really tool you can have in your arsenal. I would do a few things here if you're focused on having them shift to higher selling things. (1) Articulate Value - what is the customer getting for paying more? What are the benefits they would gain with this? (2) Teach them to place competitive traps - what are questions they could be asking their prospects to place some FUD in their minds? I have done things like "below the iceberg" documents for AEs which teach them all the thin ...Read More

2,416 Views

1 request
How do you develop a sales enablement roadmap?

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

I love Agile practices for this...my teams have always followed a process of Intake prioritization, and constant backlog grooming to feed a roadmap.

A roadmap typically is a combination of the absolute must haves (e.g. events like SKO or infratsructure projects like getting an LMS in place or what not), and should haves (e.g. key strategic goals, new product launches requiring enablement, etc.) and some white space for all those things you can't possibly plan in fast growth companies.

2,289 Views

1 request
How do you balance sales enablement needs that you KNOW will move the needle (persona training, objection response, pitch deck) vs sales enablement requests that are transactional (e.g. "one-sheet" on a feature or internal policy)

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

Balance is always tricky. At the end of the day, it's about getting others to understand why you think this is important versus over the stuff and also understanding that bandwidth - whether it's yours as the content creator or the seller's as the content consumer - is finite, so prioritization is key.

AEs are coin operated a lot, so start with the "what's in it for me?" answer for them and that should help with the pitch.

1,811 Views

4 requests
For a product marketer who only spends a portion of their time working on sales enablement with little face-to-face time with sales, what's the best way to get buy in from a large sales team?

Roopal Shah

Guidewire Software Vice President Product Marketing • 6y

Work with your enablement team! And like with a lot of things these days, you're competiting for their attention - why should they listen to you? What's in it for them as sellers? What do they get if they listen to you on this topic?

Also, work with sales leadership and have some street cred under your belt - shadow deals, visit customers, go along on ride alongs, and really build those relationships and empathy that will allow them to trust you and want to make time for your ideas and pitches.

1,895 Views

1 request

AMA: Salesforce Former Vice President, Global Enablement, Roopal Shah on Sales Enablement

View AMA Answers

Is there a framework for creating good sales enablement decks for new B2B products or training new sales rep on your product?

If you were implementing a B2B Marketing and Sales Enablement program, what are the first 5 assets you would create?

How do you keep competitive, personas, and market research info up-to-date and moving from product marketing to sales materials?

How does sales enablement change when you go from selling a product to selling a platform?

What sales enablement changes do we need to make as we shift focus from selling to SMB and mid-market to selling to enterprise?

What are your biggest challenges in enabling global sales teams, and how do you overcome them?

How do you enable sales reps to sell higher priced packages vs your lower priced offerings?

How do you develop a sales enablement roadmap?

How do you balance sales enablement needs that you KNOW will move the needle (persona training, objection response, pitch deck) vs sales enablement requests that are transactional (e.g. "one-sheet" on a feature or internal policy)

For a product marketer who only spends a portion of their time working on sales enablement with little face-to-face time with sales, what's the best way to get buy in from a large sales team?