Sales in the Year 2020

Everyone has got some hot takes on what the future of sales looks like, so I figured I may as well throw my hat in the ring. Below are the trends that I’ve been observing.

  1. The Death of the BDR (as we know it).
    1. From what I’ve seen, BDR’s are starting to become very overpaid. I’ve heard some companies paying their BDR’s as much as $90K OTE (on target earnings). That’s insane for a role that is requires 0 years experience and is not closing actual business. I think software will eat up BDR’s with the rise of tech like PersistIQ and Salesloft. I also think Marketing will rise up and being to own demand gen much more so than they traditionally have.
  2. Streamlined Evaluations
    1. There are over 200 marketing automation tools out there. How can a VP of Marketing make sense of all of that? A platform will rise to help companies make B2B decisions just like we’ve seen for hotels (Tripadvisor), vacations (Airbnb), restaurants (Yelp) and household chores (Thumbtack).
  3. Steak Dinner Sales on the Rise
    1. I keep hearing that steak dinner sales reps are dying and the inside model is the way to go. To define what a steak dinner sales rep means, it’s a sales cycle based on building a relationship with the prospect and earning trust. Due to the rise of “noise” software (marketing automation, auto dialers), B2B decision makers are more weary than ever to engage with a sales rep due to how many incessant emails / cold calls they receive every day. That’s why the sales rep who’s focused on relationship first and sale second will dominate.

So those are my three hot takes. I’m sure people are going to disagree with me, but then again, it wouldn’t be a hot take if it wasn’t a little controversial.