The Gartner Sales Podcast

Welcome to the “Great Sales Awakening.” In this episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast, host Betsy Gregory-Hosler and Dan Gottlieb explore this uniquely transformative era in B2B sales. Changes in labor, economics, resources and technology are driving a unique opportunity to chase a new revenue productivity frontier. Join us for a conversation about the three "big bets" sales leaders can take to lead this transformation: redefining leadership in the AI era, building the agentic sales organization and prioritizing future-fit talent over traditional experience.Dan Gottlieb is a vice president analyst in the Gartner for Sales practice. He writes about sales technology and covers a spectrum of topics related to AI for sales, generative AI, and seller/buyer engagement. Mr. Gottlieb combines over a decade of sales experience with creative thinking to collaborate with clients. His collaborative style invites clients to convert Gartner's research into actionable insights that yield scalable, repeatable growth. 

In the latest episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast, host Betsy Gregory Hosler talks with Gartner experts Kevin Hooper and Andy Clement to explore sales leadership in uncertain times. These seasoned executives share strategies for navigating volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) environments, drawing lessons from their own leadership roles during past crises like the Great Recession and COVID-19 pandemic.Andy Clement is an Executive Partner with Gartner's Chief Sales Officer program, where he coaches, guides, and challenges sales leaders who are Gartner clients. He joined Gartner in August 2024.Andy retired from Kimberly-Clark in March 2024 after a distinguished 33-year career. During his tenure, he held various key roles, including chief customer officer, vice president of sales, general manager, strategy director, marketing director, and manufacturing director. Andy earned his executive MBA from Vanderbilt University and his undergraduate degree from Wake Forest University.Kevin Hooper is an Executive Partner at Gartner, where he leverages over three decades of experience in technology and sales to advise clients on strategic growth and operational excellence. Before joining Gartner, Kevin held leadership roles at companies including Oracle, NEC, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, and Lenovo, where he served as North America president and general manager of the Infrastructure Solutions Group. His extensive background encompasses expertise in cloud business analytics, enterprise solutions, sales operations and strategy. Kevin is dedicated to helping organizations optimize their strategies and achieve their business objectives.

CSOs grapple with two challenges: the relentless pressure to hit quarterly targets and the need to sustain competitiveness in the long term. Research shows that only 11% of organizations successfully do both.  In this installment of the Gartner Sales Podcast, Gartner expert Greg Hessong takes us through recent research into what those organizations do differently in order to thrive in turbulent times.Greg Hessong is a Sr. Director, Analyst in the Gartner sales practice, where he studies the drivers of top performing sales teams and revenue leaders. Greg helps clients apply Gartner's research to improve collaboration, specifically between sales and marketing leaders, to boost pipeline generation, and operationalize go-to-market strategies and channels, such as account-based and inside sales, to drive more efficient and predictable revenue. 

In this episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast, host Betsy Gregory-Hosler interviews Nacho Castroverde from Cisco about a groundbreaking AI-powered prospecting tool that is transforming their sales process. The discussion delves into how Cisco's virtual sales organization, managing over 100 customers per seller, leverages AI to prioritize customer interactions and enhance sales efficiency. Nacho shares insights into the development and implementation of this AI assistant, highlighting its impact on pipeline creation, territory penetration, and conversion rates. Sales leaders will find valuable lessons on integrating AI into sales processes to drive effectiveness and scalability, making this episode a must-listen for those looking to innovate their sales strategies.

As challenges arise, chief sales officers (CSOs) are often trapped between their desire to take action and the fear of hurting revenue growth. In this episode, Gartner Sales Podcast host, Betsy Gregory-Hosler, interviews Gartner expert and former chief revenue officer (CRO), Brendan Condon, to discuss the changes that CSOs can confidently make in 2025.Brendan Condon is a senior director analyst within Gartner's CSO Strategy team covering go-to-market (GTM) strategy and CSO effectiveness. Prior to coming to Gartner, Brendan served as the global chief revenue officer of the martech firm, GDS Group. Previously, he was the CRO of Captify — the world's leading independent provider of search intelligence for global marketers and their advertising agencies. In this role, Brendan took the company to new heights of sustainable and profitable revenue, resulting in a successful sale to a private equity (PE) firm. Prior to that, Brendan was the chief revenue officer for Comcast Advertising (Effectv). He was recruited to streamline and oversee $2.5 billion in advertising revenue streams across national, regional and local agencies and clients (>25K) covering cross-screen, addressable, audience-based, linear TV and digital video solutions. Prior leadership roles include the CEO of an advanced TV ad network and a fulfilling career holding numerous positions across Time Inc., Time Warner and AOL.

In this episode, we explore the Gartner Leadership Visions for 2025, highlighting recommendations tailored to chief sales officers, sales enablement leaders and sales operations leaders. Gartner experts Robert Blaisdell, Tyler Huguley and Shayne Jackson guide us through the trends, challenges and priorities for each sales leadership role.Robert Blaisdell is a vice president, analyst and chief of research in the Gartner Sales Research and Advisory practice. He covers all aspects of sales but with a primary focus on current customer management and growth via account planning best practices and strategic key account management.Tyler Huguley is a senior director, analyst in Gartner's Sales practice. Tyler has 15 years of experience in sales and sale operations in the media, automotive and consumer goods (B2B) industries. He also has three years of experience practicing law in private practice and in-house with Cox Enterprises.Shayne Jackson is a senior director, analyst in Gartner's Sales practice. Shayne covers enablement and talent management, advising and producing research for chief sales officers and sales enablement leaders. His extensive global experience leverages a programmatic approach to learning, content and tools that elevate sales teams' effectiveness.

Sales development is an essential function for addressing pipeline challenges and driving business growth. However, CSOs are struggling to evolve the function and maximize SDRs' impact on revenue. Gartner expert Shiela Rahimian joins the podcast to discuss the best practices sales leaders should consider when assessing and optimizing their sales development function, and how to measure that function's impact.Shiela Rahimian is a Director Analyst in the Gartner for Sales Practice, where she covers all aspects of sales execution with an emphasis on pipeline generation and development, optimizing inside sales roles, launching key account programs, account planning, evolving sales processes, methodologies and playbooks within sales enablement functions. As a former Director of Sales Enablement and Sales Consultant, Mrs. Rahimian provides sales leaders with practical guidance on how to improve performance and results. 

The role of the chief sales officer (CSO) is evolving. The drive to align commercial functions is sparking growth and transformation in the CSO role itself. Podcast host Betsy Gregory-Hosler speaks with Graham Stringer, head of customer markets for Fujitsu North America, to discuss his commercial organization's transformation, how his role has changed and what it's like to be in a growing leadership position. “Even if you're not in a position as a sales leader to drive a greater level of convergence, at least see how you can lean in and be closer to those parts of the business. Don't just shrug your shoulders and say, well, that's just the way we're organized. And hey, best-case scenario, perhaps you can move the needle.” Graham Stringer is the head of customer markets for Fujitsu's North America Region, where he oversees all sales of Fujitsu's digital technology solutions and services. With over 25 years of experience in the IT industry, Graham has held key roles at DXC Technology, Oracle, Software AG, IBM and a global startup, managing teams across the U.S., Canada and Latin America. He holds a Bachelor of Math in computer science from the University of Waterloo and has completed management programs at Wharton and Queen's University.  

Sales leaders prioritize meeting buyer expectations but often fail to account for the underlying element affecting most major purchases: emotions. In this episode, hosts Billy Luckey and Betsy Gregory-Hosler sit down with Gartner experts to discuss the B2B buyer experience, how buyers balance logic and emotion and what sales leaders can do about it.Alexandra Bellis, who has a doctorate in psychology, is a director of quantitative analytics and data science for Gartner for Marketers. She is responsible for survey data collection and analysis across a wide range of marketing and communications research, including marketing data and analytics, talent and collaboration, B2B buying behaviors, and communications leadership and strategy.Rick LaFond is a senior director analyst for Gartner for Marketers, based in Baltimore. He leads Gartner's B2B customer acquisition and account growth research. As an analyst, he supports Gartner clients with insights and guidance on various marketing topics, including demand generation, digital marketing strategy, sales enablement, content marketing and account-based marketing. He is the lead analyst for Gartner research on marketing best practices in the manufacturing industry, as well as ongoing primary research studies on cross-industry B2B buying behaviors. Rick also serves as lead author for Gartner's Magic Quadrant for B2B Marketing Automation Platforms.

Chief sales officers expect their enablement teams to drive seller productivity. Yet, sales enablement leaders struggle to demonstrate their influence on sellers and overall performance. In this episode, co-hosts Betsy Gregory-Hosler and Billy Luckey talk with Gartner expert Shayne Jackson about why enablement leaders struggle to show impact, why “random acts of enablement” are a problem and how a new approach can connect enablement to results. Shayne Jackson covers enablement and talent management for the Gartner for Sales practice. His research and advice help chief sales officers and sales enablement leaders solve critical business challenges. His extensive global experience leverages a programmatic approach to learning, content and tools that elevate sales teams' effectiveness.

As the B2B sales environment has changed, the skills that sellers need to succeed have changed as well. In this episode, hosts Billy Luckey and Betsy Gregory-Hosler speak with Mike Katz, senior director for research at Gartner for Sales Leaders, to explore the latest research on critical seller skills, what has shifted in the B2B seller competency model, and how sales leaders can support these skills moving forward.Mike Katz is a senior director of research in the sales practice at Gartner with over 15 years of experience leading and managing research teams and directing mixed-methods research projects. He leads multiple research teams to generate actionable business ideas and data-driven insights for sales executives. His current focus is on sales talent, enablement and strategic planning.He has presented his research to thousands of business and government executives in briefings, webinars, workshops and conferences. His work has been featured in Harvard Business Review, The Washington Post, National Public Radio, and multiple academic journals and publications.

Despite their insights on buyers, markets and growth, CSOs rarely become CEOs. In this episode, hosts Billy Luckey and Betsy Gregory-Hosler sit down with Heather Combs, a former CSO turned CEO, to discuss her experiences and recommendations for sales leaders who aspire to do the same.Heather Combs, an accomplished leader in the technology sector, is beginning her second turn in the CEO seat, having just taken the helm at Ripple Operations, a newly formed provider of maritime logistics solutions. Previously, Heather served as CEO of StraighterLine, where her visionary leadership transformed the company into a premier provider of online courses. Under her guidance, StraighterLine pioneered innovative partnerships and streamlined operations, resulting in significant growth and enhanced student success. With a proven track record of scaling high-growth companies, Heather's strategic acumen and dedication to innovation continue to make a positive impact in the tech industry and beyond. Recognized as a Power Woman of DC Tech and a champion for women in leadership, Heather's influence extends to empowering girls in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields through the STEM for Her Advisory Council and to supporting entrepreneurs through the Mindshare board and Techstars Mentor Program.

Sales expert Lori Richardson joins Betsy and Billy to discuss the state of women in B2B sales, including the opportunities a sales career offers, the barriers women face and the actions you can take to attract and retain top women in the field.Lori Richardson is a top B2B sales influencer and a champion for getting more women into sales and sales leadership in B2B roles. In addition, she has run the data-backed sales strategy firm Score More Sales since 2002, after a career in sales and leadership. Lori is the author of “She Sells” — a book to help company leaders and sales leaders find, recruit, retain and promote more women into sales and leadership roles. She also hosts the award-winning podcast “Conversations with Women in Sales” and is a sales coach for Harvard Business School's MBA program.

As your organization's growth strategy evolves, is your go-to-market strategy keeping up? In this episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast, co-hosts Betsy Gregory-Hosler and Billy Luckey speak with Gartner expert Rachael Buchler to discuss the four types of go-to-market strategies, the symptoms of misalignment, and how sales leaders should approach the challenge. Rachael Buchler is a senior director analyst in Gartner's Sales practice. Rachael has more than 25 years experience in B2B retail energy sales where she led strategic initiatives and operational teams to drive customer growth and deliver cross-functional efficiencies. She has developed and executed go-to-market sales strategies for both existing and emerging markets and integrated B2B sales teams as part of merger and acquisition activities. She is a qualified coach and a member of the International Coaching Federation (ICF).

After over a year of hype, what is the real state of generative AI (GenAI) in B2B sales? In this episode, Betsy and Billy speak with Gartner expert Adnan Zijadic to discuss how sales leaders and the C-suite are engaging with GenAI, which use cases are gaining ground, and where sales leaders are missing out.Adnan Zijadic is a director analyst in the Sales Technologies team at Gartner for Sales Leaders. His research focuses on sales force automation (SFA/CRM) platforms, evaluations, and strategy, along with Sales AI use cases and best practices. Not only that, he also pioneered Gartner's first ever workable CRM readiness assessment, the SPEED framework. 

In 2024, the most successful CSOs will exert as much influence internally as they do externally, aligning closely with executive peers and championing the commercial organization's needs. In this episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast, co-hosts Betsy Gregory-Hosler and Billy Luckey speak with Dave Egloff, Gartner Vice President Analyst, to explore how CSOs can build C-suite collaboration and trust.Dave Egloff is a VP Analyst in Gartner's sales practice. He actively advises and produces research for sales and commercial executives to boost their teams effectiveness and optimize their go-to-market strategies. With more than 20 years of global experience, Dave's holistic approach combines qualitative assessments with quantitative insights. His areas of expertise include sales design and optimization, go-to-market strategy, sales transformation, sales operations and sales compensation.

In this episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast, Betsy and Billy sit down with Gartner Chief of Research Robert Blaisdell to discuss our recently published 2024 CSO Leadership Vision. Robert explains the Leadership Vision results, including key trends and recommendations that will help CSOs anticipate and respond to market changes across the coming year.Robert Blaisdell is the Chief of Research for the Gartner Sales Practice. Robert has 20 years of experience in strategic account management, account planning, sales enablement, strategic planning and marketing.

Sales leaders have great expectations for their key account programs, but they frequently disappoint.  Gartner expert Dan Hawkyard joins Betsy and Billy to discuss why key accounts so often underperform and how sales leaders can strengthen them for a fast start in 2024.Dan Hawkyard is a Senior Principal Analyst in the Gartner for Sales Leaders Expert Team. He works with global sales leaders on their journey towards maturing their commercial functions and his expertise include key and account management, customer segmentation and buying insights and experience.

Your sales strategy may be a work of art, but the most brilliant plan means nothing if sellers won't execute. In this episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast, Betsy and Billy talk to Gartner Sr. Research Specialist Delainey Kirkwood, discussing how CSOs can drive effective seller behavior change and measure enablement's impact in their organizations.Delainey Kirkwood is a Senior Research Specialist in Gartner's Sales Research Practice. In her current role, Delainey creates and communicates insights and tools focused on addressing the mission-critical priorities of sales enablement leaders, particularly on the topics of revenue enablement and behavior change. Delainey is the managing editor of Gartner's Chief Sales Officer Quarterly. Delainey is a graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill and she began her career in manufacturing operations. She has been with Gartner for three years.

What does the future hold for the B2B seller? In this episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast, Betsy and Billy talk to Gartner expert Alice Walmesley, discussing how CSOs can reimagine the seller role for the future.

You may be sold on the value of Generative AI (GenAI), but how do you actually buy it?  In this episode, Betsy and Doug continue their conversation with Dan Gottlieb, the lead analyst for GenAI in the Gartner sales practice. Dan discusses what B2B sales leaders should consider when acquiring GenAI capabilities for their sales organizations.

Generative AI (GenAI) offers new and exciting opportunities in B2B sales, if you can harness it. In this episode, Doug and Betsy speak with Dan Gottlieb, the lead analyst for GenAI in the Gartner sales practice. Dan sheds light on how GenAI can be used in B2B sales, ways to address common risk factors and where sales leaders can begin.

Amid economic uncertainty, technology is crucial to revenue growth. However, investments in sales training and enormous amounts of revenue technology are not improving sales effectiveness for most companies.In this episode, Doug and Betsy speak with professor and author Dr. Howard Dover, discussing:How to develop modern sales methods and become a sales disruptorHow digital buying has changed traditional sales activityHow organizational and environmental obstacles keep the field in a state of paradox

Machine customers aren't just coming — in some places, they are already here. In this episode, Betsy and Doug speak with Don Scheibenreif and Mark Raskino, Gartner experts and authors of “When Machines Become Customers,” to discuss how machine customers are changing B2B sales. Don Scheibenreif is a distinguished vice president analyst at Gartner based in California and a leader of Gartner's research on customer experience. He works primarily with IT and business leaders on topics at the intersection of technology and customers. Don has led the development of Gartner's research on machine customers since 2015. He is an accomplished international keynote speaker and has won numerous thought leadership awards for his work on digital business, Gartner's IT Symposium Opening Keynotes, and the future of customer experience. Before joining Gartner in 2010, Don spent 22 years as a senior marketing leader in the consumer packaged goods, retail and B2B distribution markets.

In this episode, Doug and Betsy speak with Steve Rietberg, VP analyst with Gartner's Sales Research practice, about Gartner's current sales operations leadership vision and the power of comparative performance metrics.Steve Rietberg is a world-renowned author, speaker and sales operations leader with extensive experience conceiving and implementing methodology and technology solutions to address critical business needs. Steve specializes in mobilizing cross-functional teams to streamline operations and deliver actionable insights through data and analytics.

Women remain underrepresented in B2B sales, comprising 24% of individual seller roles and 21% of sales leadership roles, according to the 2022 Gartner Chief Sales Officer Strategy Survey.In this episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast with co-hosts Betsy Gregory-Hosler and Doug Bushée, we talk to Cynthia Barnes, author, sales influencer, and founder of the National Association of Women Sales Professionals. Many recruitment strategies that are geared to women don't work; Cynthia helps us unpack why that's happening, even as there's a sales talent scarcity across many industries.Cynthia Barnes, founder of the National Association of Women Sales Professionals, is the first Black woman to keynote a national sales conference. She is a LinkedIn Top Voice, LinkedIn Top Sales influencer, and 2x Salesforce Top Influencer. Cynthia is also the creator of THRIVE: Success Strategies for Women in Sales, a women-centric sales training delivered to more than 15,500 women worldwide.

In this episode, the team speaks with sales thought leader David Brock. David shares his thoughts on the role of the CSO in 2023, the challenges sales leaders are facing, and key trends that are changing B2B sales.

In this episode of the Gartner Sales Podcast, Betsy and Doug sit down with Gartner Chief of Research Craig Riley to discuss our recently published 2023 Leadership Vision series. Each Leadership Vision is individually tailored for CSOs, sales enablement leaders and sales operations leaders. They are designed to help sales leaders anticipate market changes and necessary responses across the coming year. About The GuestCraig Riley is chief of research for Gartner for Sales Leaders. Craig is focused on helping commercial leaders respond to changes in B2B buying behavior in ways that produce long-term revenue growth. As a Gartner analyst, Craig sees countless examples of effective go-to-market structures, sales force deployment models, and pipeline generation strategies. He uses that information to share what top companies and their leaders do to differentiate themselves in the market and pull ahead of the competition.

In this episode, the team speaks with Gartner expert Kristina LaRocca-Cerrone, discussing new research on the successful alignment of sales and marketing. Kristina describes how both digital and human interactions can underperform, where sales leaders are in their alignment journeys, and what smart organizations are doing to get it right. About the GuestKristina LaRocca-Cerrone is a Sr. Director, Advisory for Gartner and helps enterprise marketers better understand how customers (both B2B and B2C) buy and make decisions. Kristina's work includes topics like how buying groups research potential suppliers and make purchase decisions, and how to create compelling content marketing aligned to the customer journey. Her work examines how to improve overall digital experiences (in a way that is industry-agnostic) to impact customer behavior, and how to effectively engage in customer journey mapping and persona building. Kristina also covers marketing leadership and strategy, and marketing organization trends.

In this episode, Doug sits down with Melissa Hilbert, senior director at Gartner in the Application IT Leaders Group. Melissa discusses her leading work in revenue enablement, including a recent revenue enablement maturity model, revenue enablement Market Guide and key insights for chief sales officers, chief revenue officers and other sales leaders.  Melissa Hilbert is a senior director at Gartner in the Application IT Leaders Group, where she is responsible for the revenue (formerly sales) enablement agenda within digital commerce and CRM sales technology, which includes a Market Guide. The technology includes sales content, training and coaching. She covers the digital adoption platform market, which also includes a Market Guide. She is also responsible for sales performance management (SPM). She has extensive knowledge of SPM systems and processes, including sales incentive compensation, quota management and territory management. She has additional expertise in digital sales rooms. She contributes to research on Gartner's CX CORE model. She also covers sales force automation (SFA)/CRM tools around adoption and usage and high-level strategy as well as digital twin of a customer for sales.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is finding its way into sales technology, but how can AI impact sales performance and revenue growth? This week, Doug Bushée and Betsy Gregory-Hosler speak with Gartner Senior Director and Analyst Robert Blaisdell to hear how AI helps sales organizations better align to buyer preferences for seller-free engagement and multithreaded sales experiences. Listeners will also hear how AI also enables CSOs to reduce sales cycles and increase forecasting accuracy.Robert Blaisdell is a Senior Director Analyst in the Gartner Sales Research and Advisory Practice. He covers all aspects of sales, but has a primary focus on current customer management and growth via account planning best practices and strategic key account management.  Robert has 20 years of experience in strategic account management, account planning, sales enablement, strategic planning and marketing. Most recently he worked as the Senior Director of Sales and Account Management Strategic Planning and Execution at Express Scripts. In his role, he led the division of the sales and account management organization of seven departments in the areas of strategic planning, execution and operations. Robert has extensive experience driving the development and implementation of internal and external business solutions, methodologies and best practices to increase customer retention and account growth. He is leader for research with the Sales Strategy and Leadership Key Initiative.

Today's selling environment is taking a toll on sellers. Supply chain issues, price increases, and the challenges presented by working in a more remote and digital environment lead to seller fatigue, decreased morale, and higher attrition. Sales leaders are working harder than ever to keep seller motivation high and address these issues. In this episode, the team sits down with Alice Walmesley, director, advisory, from the Gartner for Sales Leaders practice. Alice shares new Gartner research into seller motivation and shows us that a focus on seller drive may be missing the mark.Alice Walmesley is a Director in Gartner's Expert Advisory team. Alice consults with cross-industry heads of sales/senior sales leaders to understand and address their most pressing challenges and opportunities for growth. She provides guidance derived from Gartner sales quantitative and best-practice research into sales execution, enablement, and strategy areas. She has been with Gartner for nine years.

In this episode, the team sits down with Daniel Hawkyard, senior principal, advisory, from the Gartner for Sales Leaders practice. Daniel just hosted a gathering of sales leaders called “CSO Priorities for a Disrupted World” and has a collection of insights on the mindset of today's leaders as they navigate an uncertain economic climate. Daniel Hawkyard is a senior principal in Gartner's Expert Advisory team. He works with global sales executives to help them on their journey towards maturing their commercial functions. His expertise include changes in B2B buying behavior, the future of selling, as well as customer understanding and engagement strategies.

In this episode, Craig sits down with Dan Gottlieb, senior director analyst from the Gartner for Sales practice. As the head of the Gartner for Sales Leaders Revenue Technology Strategy research agenda, Dan has the pulse of this exploding market. Dan and Craig discuss data from a couple of recent Gartner studies, and they talk about what's happening today in revenue technology, from the current stack to what's coming for the rest of 2022. Dan Gottlieb leads Gartner's Revenue Technology Strategy Key Initiative and covers a spectrum of topics related to pipeline generation. Dan combines a decade of SaaS sales experience and creative thinking to collaborate with clients. His facilitation style invites clients to convert Gartner's research into actionable insights that yield scalable, repeatable growth. He believes meetings are most effective when they're fun. As a SaaS sales leader, Dan's responsibilities spanned quota-carrying sales, operations and enablement at fast-growing companies.

In this episode, Craig sits down with Dale Chang, Operating Partner with Silicon Valley venture capital firm, Scale Venture Partners. Known as “Scale Dale,” he will share the key elements of the playbook required to drive explosive yet efficient growth.Dale Chang is the Operating Partner at Scale Venture Partners. In his role, Dale is a resource for guidance on evolving go-to-market strategies as well as providing best practices and benchmarks across the portfolio.Previously, Dale was a director at the Alexander Group, a consulting firm specialized in go-to-market strategy. At the Alexander Group, he was the leader of the cloud practice and advised companies including Salesforce, LinkedIn, Box, DocuSign, New Relic, Optimizely and Mixpanel. Prior to his career in consulting, he worked in sales and sales operations roles at startups, including Proofpoint and Jaspersoft.

In this episode of The Gartner Sales Podcast, Brent and Steve discuss three ways the rise of digital buying and selling will force sales leaders to reassess their use of technology to support commercial efforts. Steve provides sales leaders with specific recommendations to get ahead of the digital (r)evolution and ensure they maximize benefit from coming change.

In this episode, Craig sits down with Olivia Nottebohm, chief revenue officer at Notion. Notion is a high-growth “decacorn” (a startup that has reached $10 billion-plus in valuation) that has used a groundbreaking go-to-market strategy to get there: community-led growth. Nottebohm provides actionable insights and best practices for building a community-led growth strategy, including the framework and best practices Notion leveraged.

Brent Adamson and Gartner Executive Partner, Maria Boulden discuss the specific steps sales leaders can take to ensure their teams remain effective and engaged in a time of deep disruption to global supply chains. The two also consider implications for customer engagement and sales compensation.

In this episode, Craig sits down with Doug Landis, growth partner at Silicon Valley venture capital firm Emergence Capital. Craig and Doug discuss the actionable insights from Doug's experiences that drove impressive growth at Salesforce and Box and across the Emergence Capital portfolio. They discuss Doug's repeatable framework for hypergrowth and dive into specifics around pipeline generation, sales enablement, tech stack and more.

Brent and Gartner analyst Dan Gottlieb sit down to discuss today's dynamic sales technology landscape, which can only be described as “mayhem.” Brent and Dan explore reasons for the intense activity and project where things are likely headed next. They also discuss advice for sales leaders considering the acquisition of sales technology in today's market.

In this episode, Craig sits down with Chris Degnan, Chief Revenue Officer of Snowflake. Craig and Chris will identify the actionable insights from Chris' experiences (good and bad) that drove Snowflake's impressive growth and led to the most successful IPO in stock market history. They discuss Degnan's overall sales strategy and dive into specifics around pipeline generation, sales enablement, sales-marketing alignment, tech stack, and more.Runtime: 50:25

Brent Adamson and Craig Rosenberg review each of the top five mistakes sales leadership teams commits when buying and implementing sales technology.  Chief among those errors are a failure to account for the overall seller experience in introducing new technology and overlooking the need for a phased rollout aligned to different sellers' openness to new tool adoption.  

In the rapidly evolving world of B2B buying, customers' increasingly strong preference for a seller-free buying experience means suppliers must dramatically rethink the manner in which their sales reps interact with customers.  At the most progressive companies, sales leaders see this evolution less as a zero-sum game between digital and human interaction and more as an opportunity to integrate the two far more tightly than ever before. In this podcast, Brent and Alice review two companies well down that path and explore the advantages to moving from a “rep-or-digital” posture to a “rep-and-digital” posture. 

In this podcast, Nick and Brient discuss the dramatically changing role of sales reps in B2B selling as customers increasingly shift to digital purchase channels.  Within that context, the two introduce a particularly important opportunity for professional sellers to differentiate themselves in today's buying landscape, given customers' struggle to reach complex purchase decisions.  They close their conversation with a review of the internal organizational changes necessary to adapt the entire commercial engine (sales, marketing, success, service) to this new buying landscape.  

Craig Riley is a senior principal analyst with Gartner for Sales Leaders. As an analyst, Mr. Riley works with sales leaders from large and midsize enterprises to uncover best-practice solutions that address their most critical business challenges. His research has focused on improving sales force productivity, sales operations and inside sales. He frequently advises clients on how organizations can improve their new customer acquisition and prospecting efforts.Run Time 32:32

During this episode, Brent, Dave, and Maria discuss three imperatives all sales leaders should consider to position their organizations for a rapid recovery in the post-pandemic commercial landscape.  Starting with a discussion on managing competing time horizons, the conversation then turns to enabling virtual selling, redeploying resources, and establishing a unified commercial strategy.  Run Time: 38 minutes.

During this podcast, Brent, Steve, and Tom dig into the core design principles of both customer buying journey mapping and “customer verifier” construction.  Discussion ranges broadly across both the implementation and potential use cases of a building a far more customer-centric view of deal status.  Along the way, the trio shares examples, reviews common challenges, and explores practical solutions.  Run Time: 35:21

During this podcast, Brent and Danielle review a number of surprising findings from Gartner's most recent work on front-line sales managers, including the statistically limited potential of sales coaching to boost sales performance.  In addition, they discuss Gartner's sales manager performance diagnostic and share best practices from several companies significantly rethinking how they deploy and support sales managers in their own organizations.Run Time 29:17

During this podcast, Brent and Neha discuss both the tactical and strategic considerations important to ensure virtual selling success among sales reps traditionally used to selling in person. They also explore the distinction between a short-term switch from in-person to virtual selling versus a longer, more strategic evolution toward fewer in-person sales interactions more broadly. Run Time: 25 Minutes

Dave Egloff is a Vice President, Analyst in Gartner's Sales Practice.  Mr. Egloff advises and writes on topics spanning sales strategy and operations.  His specialties include sales force design & deployment, sales performance optimization, organizational design, sales cost optimization, M&A, and workforce planning.

During this podcast, Brent and Craig explore the specific steps sales teams can take to adapt their commercial messaging for prospective customers navigating the world of COVID-19. They also review the importance of changing customer buying behavior, customer (re)segmentation, and competitor considerations.  Runtime 30:10