Hiring Your First Salesperson

Gia Scinto: Never use the title Chief Revenue Officer. If I would be a customer, I would feel strange to talk to the Chief Revenue Officer. Head of Sales is just fine.

David Obrand: What you want in a Sales of a Startup
1) Intellectual Horsepower
2) Technical Aptitude
3) Passion for your Customer's Success
4) Loves a frantic environment
5) Can live with delayed gratification

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Important: When hiring a sales tell them the long term opportunity/story. Not just what the company is now.

Sales:
You need to listen to customers, what problems they have. Asking hard questions.
Only then can you create a bridge in the mind of the customer from their problem to your product

Backchannel references about a Sales
References from the Sales Rep itself are normally not worth exploring. There is always a guy telling nice things.
Instead ask a former customer of the Sales Rep: Would you buy from them again, and why?

Remote Sales Reps is a no-go
Startup: NEVER work with a Remote Sales Rep. Companies need to be together

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Also worth watching:
John Doerr: What To Look For When Joining a Company





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Kaywa Inc : Inside Sales / Customer Care

We are looking for an Inside Sales Specialist and/or Customer Care Officer for Kaywa Inc in San Francisco. Send a mail to contact at kaywa dot com if you are interested.

FIRST TALKS
Cyril from Swissnex just asked me to write more about my first talks with people here. So I try to do that right away.


SOFTWARE PEOPLE
It’s almost impossible to meet somebody who is not working for a software company or is trying to found one or is in other way part of the ecosystem (see below). The other day I was down in San Jose for a Iaido seminar and I was basically sitting with people from Zynga in a car.
San Francisco and the Valley: this means you constantly tell your story and others pitch theirs to you and you check if there is a personal or business fit or both. This also means ideas are swarming around you constantly.


THE ECOSYSTEM
My first kind of business focused talks were with some people at the Social-Loco Conference. What became apparent is that there is an ecosystem regarding the mobile space, and for us more specifically the QR Code/EAN/NFC space, There is a market and there is data and there are competitors and analysts and investors (angels and VC’s) and lawyers and now also crowdfunding (Kickstarter). All this works hand in hand.

This is one of the first things you notice here. Whereas in Europe we often tend to hang loosely in the air and have to establish the market ourselves through the seller-buyer relationship, here your backdrop is always the ecosystem.
The ecosystem is the base and new markets emerge in it and get established quickly. And because the US market is so huge in itself, even niches can be one billion dollar markets.

The ecosystem extends also to founders and cofounders. I met several people who had a vague idea of what they want to do and looked for a cofounder. Or founders who looked out for an idea. This kind of behaviour I guess is only possible when the ecosystem is around for it.


THE AMERICAN WAY OF DOING THINGS
In Europe generating revenue quickly is considered more important then creating a huge market and dominating it, so our european business models tend to be much more short term focused in general. And it seems almost impossible to create a market in Europe as size really matters.

This was very obvious in discussions I had with my first hosts who happen to be entrepreneurs, lawyers and biz dev people. They tend to favor the free model to get more potential future customers later. This almost always means you need a lot of cash before you can cash in. And here in the Valley, it is possible to get seed funding of 2 Mio USD. Where else is this possible?


PIVOT AND FIND THE SWEET SPOT
Starting your business and pivoting is considered normal. Pivoting is also the only way to avoid failure. And therefore there is a lot of tryin out as a business mentality. In Switzerland we tend to have almost 5 year plans after the soviet model. The absurd cult of the business plan in Switzerland is striking in this regard. Here you just have to nail it somehow and then you are starting to get interesting.
Also the time horizon is here significantly shorter – one year tends to be a time span that people consider as normal – as they all know that within a year everything can change.


PING ME/REACTION TIME
One of the more striking things in comparison to Switzerland is how fast meetings are set up. Whereas we tend to have agendas that push meetings back to one and half months easily, here meetings happen today, tomorrow or at least in the same week. And nobody aks for references but intros or your story has always to be good.
Naturally the attention span is accordingly – but how could it be otherwise.

Regarding customers this also means the reaction time should be as short as possible. And this is why we need to be here.


THE ABSENCE OF POWERPOINT
In the last three weeks, I have only seen one powerpoint deck and it was halfway hidden by a curtain at a conference and showed only about 5 slides.
So how ideas are presented? – It’s all in the talking.

TAKE OFF IN A FRENZY
Frenzy is the good word to start, as it all started with an adrenalin bump as my AirBnB place was canceled only two days before I wanted to move in. So on Saturday morning, the day my plane would take off for San Francisco, I still had no room. Fortunately my plane was delayed and using the mobile ticket service from SWISS I was warned by SMS – one of the huge benefits that mobile offers - , I could dedicate a bit more time to find a place. As AirBnB also uses SMS I finally got one in time in South Mission. And a wonderful place too, but more about that later.


MY BIKE IS MY HORSE
Once I had a room, I needed a bike, the easiest way around town even in hilly San Francisco. At first I started renting one. On Monday it fell apart. The next I tried, got stolen at Harrison/5th street. In between my host Lisha had also offered me one – but it was too small. Good for her. Finally I bought a city bike at Valencia Cylery with helmet and a way better lock.
So far – fingers crossed - my bike performs as it should and brings me from SOMA 2nd street to the Mission on 22nd street within 20 minutes.


FIRST MINGLING AT THE SOCIAL-LOCO CONFERENCE
On Monday, June 18th, I was at the Social-Loco conference which was a bit like watching american television. Lots of discussions and according to your attention you glean something here and there.
Coming from stiffy and formal Switzerland the thing that hit me immediately was the californian informality of such an event, best illustrated by VC Dave McClure coming in flip flops on stage.
And obviously mobile comes first here. And I repeat it again: nothing, but MOBILE FIRST.

At the end of the conference, I already was on my way out – jet lagged to death – I came back the moment the organizers were announcing their last giveaway: an iPad3.
And the winnner is...- „ah a business card with a QR Code“ - ... Roger Fischer. Uups, that’s me. How did that go?
As my brain was changing gears from very slow to normal speed, I vaguely remembered having thrown my bizcard in a pot earler in the morning. Lesson here: A QR Code can win you an iPad.
Not only was the iPad a kick that woke me up instantly, it also was an ideal connector at the Cocktail Party. Finally after a Boston Analyst of the whole QR Code/EAN Barcode space, I met two South Africans who want to set up business here - "this is the place to be!" - and we went to Burma Superstar in chilly Richmond. The famous tea leave salad and all other burmese dishes were delicious and were well worth the freezing 1 hour wait.


To be continued... (hopefully)

Kaywa Reader fürs iPhone herunterladen: Scannen - Bild antippen oder drehen - Website öffnen. It's a Darb!

Die Stadt Zürich hat unter m.stadt-zuerich.ch und m.ewz.ch einen mobilen Webauftritt lanciert. Dort findet sich ein ausgewählter Teil des städtischen Informationsangebots.

Stadt Zürich




EWZ

Obwohl wir dies schon letztes Jahr zur etwa gleichen Zeit entwickelt haben, habe ich völlig vergessen über unseren Vorschlag eines neuen NFC Logos zu berichten.
Hier sieht man das Endresult auf der rechten Seite der beiden Bilder (aufs Bild klicken, um zur grösseren Ansicht zu gelangen). Ich werde den Design Prozess, wie auch das Warum in einem späteren Beitrag ausführlicher diskutieren.

(de) Zuerst dachte ich, es würde etwas schwierig werden, diesen QR Code zu scannen, da er auf einer Scheibe angebracht ist. Aber mit dem neuen revolutionären Kaywa Reader fürs iPhone (bald auch verfügbar im Appstore), konnte ich ihn einfach von der anderen Tramseite bzw. von meinem Sitz aus scannen. Hier noch zwei Fotos (siehe oben), für die ich dann doch noch aufstehen musste.

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(en) At first sight, I thought it would a bit tricky to scan this QR Code because of the transparency. But with the new revolutionary Kaywa Reader on iPhone (will soon be out on the Appstore), it was really easy. I also took some photos (see above), so that you can check it out yourself.

Scan und besuche das Hotel Bellevue des Alpes auf DokoDare

The Kaywa Ticket Scanner App is now also available for iPhones and iPads:
Kaywa Ticket Scanner App available on iTunes.

Or download it directly via QR Code:



See also:
Kaywa Ticket Scanner App for Android


Shortly we will announce some major events using Kaywa Ticket. So stay tuned!