Jen Abel
@jjen_abel
co-founder @jjellyfish_co, GM of Enterprise @stateaffairsUS • sharing non-obvious startup advice
i truly believe startups have higher odds of success putting a non-sales person into an early-stage sales role than putting someone with sales experience
sales is actually really, really fun it’s a lot more creative and entrepreneurial than anyone gives credit to
'wait to go after the tier 1 logos' = terrible sales advice tier 1 logos ARE the early adopters for startups looking to tackle the enterprise
in majority of cases, providing a sales decks too early hurts you more than helps you you gave them all the intel to sell internally w/o you
startups, in almost all cases ... free pilots are a net negative free pilots are a net negative free pilots are a net negative
most startup sales advice is complete trash you should be breaking sales rules/advice not following it the whole game is about unlocking the different
the biggest misunderstanding in startups is customer conversations in early days, market/customer discovery is for testing insight NOT for creating insight
my shortlist of startup sales learnings over the years ... 1. 0-1 sales talent does not exist. Founders, this is you. 2. Product/market fit is (almost) always found in adjacent markets. Don’t handcuff yourself to Day 1 market vision. 3. The demo should never be focused on the…
startups — from all of my sales experience, seldom do warm intros from non-customers every close ... on the contrary, intros from customers is the highest signal don't confuse these two ...
startups: the market truly care about your speed to reply ... esp. in the enterprise it's one of the biggest ways to show respect check emails on holidays, weekends, after-hours ... it does matter
the crazy part about sales, is the most successful sales folks didn't start their career in sales ... it's truly the hardest role to hire for
there are no sales tricks it’s about positioning and deal creativity co-authored with customer
sales tip write your note in iMessage before you write it in email will change the whole vibe, for the better
enterprise sales is creativity, precision, and friendship it's seldom taught
startups: the problem with most sales folks is they walk/talk like sales some of the best sales talent comes from non-traditional sales background this is also why Founders and forward-deployed engineers are found to be far more successful in role
startups — its much harder to get free users to start paying than to acquire paid users from the start never do free pilots
enteprise startups, now starts the window of time in the year to be allocated into 2026 budget … July 1 - Oct 1
for all startups pivoting and moving up-market into enterprise: the more technical your pitch, the more you'll be delegated down the chain of command.