June 26, 2022 • 21 mins
Episode 18 we interview Kevin Hopp CEO of Hopp Consulting Group and Host of the Sales Career Podcast. Kevin shares his experience helping early and late-stage Technology companies put the right technologies, process, and people in place to do sales outreach correctly. His strategies start with a conversational approach first.
Hopp Consulting Group has a podcast called the Sales Career Podcast dedicated to bringing the best-selling practices through interviews with today's top sales leaders. Tune in to the podcast here https://www.hoppconsultinggroup.com/podcast-1
About Hopp Consulting Group:
Hopp Consulting Group was launched in 2018 when Kevin realized that his natural ability and love of cold calling was truly unique. The first year of Hopp Consulting Group was all outbound-as-a-service, with Kevin making cold calls and converting at a remarkably high rate for his clients. HCG evolved when the opportunity came for Kevin to help build a company that did outbound-as-a-service, so Kevin could transfer his knowledge to others and build a team that converts cold conversations into warm customers. That experience parlayed into HCG taking on a much more strategic approach to helping businesses looking to build outbound process and structure.
Learn More:
https://www.hoppconsultinggroup.com/
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Episode Transcript
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Play the King (00:00):
This podcast is sponsored by OMI.
The company that makes CRM work!Today's guest is Kevin Hopp CEO
of Hopp Consulting Group.
So Kevin, welcome to thepodcast.
I would like to start just byasking you about Hopp Consulting
Group, obviously, the autonomousconsulting group.
(00:20):
What do you do?
Who do you serve?
I'm familiar with your podcast,which is excellent, but let's
assume that the people listeningare not, tell us about yourself.
Kevin Hopp (00:28):
Sure thing.
Yeah, my name's Kevin Hopp.
I run my own small consultingbusiness and I make sure to say
the word small, because I amvery committed to being a solo
entrepreneur for at least thenext year and a half.
So all my clients get my time.
Why is my time important?
Why would they work with me?
So I, I work exclusively withearly stage and late, early
(00:50):
stage tech companies.
So my experience in the workingworld has all been with early
stage tech companies.
So I've been the first hire in abusiness four different times.
Three of those were softwarecompanies.
So I've always been the only guyin the room when the founder
looks around and says, who arewe gonna sell to?
How are we gonna do this?
(01:10):
Like what's our go to marketlook like?
So I've had to do that so manytimes that now I have a passion
for doing it the right way forearly stage technology
companies.
And I do feel like, I'veunlocked a bit of a cheat code
here.
with, what I do for VCbacked tech companies.
The idea of if you have capitaland you want to go talk to your
(01:32):
market, you want to get net newconversations going.
I really Excel at building thosesoftware systems, like a
technology stack with a wholeprocess around why building it
that way with the whole processaround how we use that
technology stack to generate netnew business for tech startups.
So the shortest way to say it isI do outbound sales consulting.
(01:54):
The longest way to say it is,I'm a cold calling geek with a
lot of really specificexperience.
I only work with tech companiescommitted to growth!
Play the King (02:04):
And this may be obvious, but most of your
clients, I assume, are B2Bcompanies, right?
Kevin Hopp (02:08):
Yeah.
That's all my experience.
So a hundred percent of myexperience is B2B.
And I only work with B2Bcompanies because I know that
motion very, very well.
Uh, The bottom line of mymethodology, I call it
conversation first.
So I'm all about cold calling,the way I tell that story is
making what is old new again,you know, the rise of the silent
(02:31):
sales floor, the rise of sales,automation, sales, enablement,
marketing, all that's really,really great.
If your company invests inmarketing the right way, you
might not have to do a lot ofthat ice cold outbound motion.
But the founders that work withme work with me because they
say, shoot, you're right.
Like my sales floor is quiet.
My sales reps don't know how totalk the talk because they spend
(02:52):
all their time taking orders andwe need to go make it happen for
ourselves.
And that is not easy.
Right?
Cold calling is not anybody'sfavorite thing.
And I, I know that and Iacknowledge that and I make it
suck less!
Play the King (03:05):
so, I
want to ask you a bunch of
questions about, your businessand, who you guys help and, why
companies come to you.
But I'm curious about just yourbackground real quick.
You know, it sounds like youspecialize in going from like
zero to best friends, right.
Or at least that's the goal withwhoever you're calling at, what
age did you figure out?
Okay, I'm an extrovert I'm verygood at insinuating myself or
(03:27):
being charming or, you know,just the skills that, that it
takes to be somebody who can geton the phone with somebody who
doesn't know who you are and,and then have them sort of
eating out of your hand in thenext five minutes.
Kevin Hopp (03:39):
That's wow.
Really good question.
because you know, what Ilike to say about people that
are good at outbound sales andmost like people that end up
kind of in sales, we are thekids that growing up, like your
parents and your friends andpeople would be like, man, you
should be a lawyer.
Look at the way youargue, you point there, look at
(04:01):
the way you get what you wantall the time.
You should be a lawyer.
And then like the kids that endup in sales are the ones that
don't like school that'sme.
I didn't like school.
I graduated with a four yeardegree, but man, I didn't,
didn't turn around.
As I walked out the door, I waslike, all right, I'm out, I'm
done with school.
But, I noticed that I had thegift of the gab.
(04:21):
It took me until my workingyears.
I thought sales was a dirtyword.
I, you gotta understand like mybackground though, like my
father, was a PhD in mechanicalengineering, my mother was a
stay at home Mom.
I didn't know any sales people.
Like I knew nobody that was asales person.
The only person I knew growingup that was a salesperson was my
friend's dad.
And what I knew was that he gotlaid off every few years and
(04:44):
like that he was constantlywithout a job.
And like my family didn't talkpositively about that.
right.
Interesting.
Like, oh yeah, Bob got laid offagain.
Mm-hmm and sothat's what I thought sales was.
So when I got into college, Idid some internships.
I realized in the working world,like I interned at this company
called Invoca, they raised$30million.
(05:05):
It was a tech startup indowntown Santa Barbara.
That felt like Silicon valley.
It was really, really cool.
Mm-hmm and all thenoise, all the fun, all the
energy in the office was in thesales corner, right.
Where the 10 sales people wereand they were doing demos and
banging gongs and all thatstuff.
And then I, I was doing acustomer success internship with
account management.
(05:25):
And I was like, dude, I amclicking in a spreadsheet all
day and sitting quietly in anoffice while someone talking on
a Polycom to a customer about aproblem.
And I'm looking out the glassdoor of the office, like leaning
over at the sales pick, going,God, that looks fun.
You know?
And then I just have that kindof high energy attitude.
(05:46):
So long story short, you know,my first job out of college was
I was the first hire at astartup.
I was the first hire, so I gotto do everything.
But then I noticed right awaythat I'm like, oh wow.
A lot of people struggle withsales.
They struggle with this.
And they, they are just notlike, oh man, cold calling.
No way.
I'm like, yeah, I don't care.
I'll call them, sure you tell methere's money in it for me.
Let's go.
Play the King (06:07):
that's
actually, I mean, well, you
talked about, you know, sort ofin your family sales, having a
bad rap, you know, it feels likeit was just, you know, not
appreciated the, the importanceof it right.
In, in a, in a business like cuzcuz in, in certain businesses,
salesmen are like the, you know,they're the, the, the fighter
pilots, right?
They're the, the golden boys.
Um, what, uh, you know, talk tome about businesses that get
(06:30):
this right?
Who, who, what do they, what dothey understand about needing
this role to really be sort oflike acing it for them?
Kevin Hopp (06:36):
That's a great question.
It's kind of a,I mean, there's,there's, there's two little
answers there.
I think one of the answers is,you know, my, my perspective of
sales growing up came from notknowing any sales people, right?
Like, and my dad as an engineer,loathed sales people, because he
never had to deal with them.
And when he did, it was like fora big project he's working on
and then he hated it.
(06:56):
Right.
Mm-hmm.
But as I've seen in myconsulting work and in the first
few, first six years of mycareer, when I was working w
twos, there, there tends to be alack of respect in general,
around sales that, thatsalespeople are a dime a dozen
or that salespeople are onlycoin operated.
Right.
Like I, I have, I think Umbridgewith that idea too.
Uh, when I tell people that I'ma sales consultant, a lot of
(07:19):
people will say, oh cool, well,I'd be happy to hire you
commission only mm-hmm and I'm like,
whoa, no, I'm a consultant inthat.
I teach process, structure andstrategy at the same level as
your, you know, projectmanagement consultant, the same
level as your engineeringconsultant, where it's very
strategic and my knowledge iswhat you are buying mm-hmm
right.
So I, I'm not coin operated.
(07:40):
I don't work commission only.
And I, I actually really,haven't made straight commission
in probably three years, three,four years.
Everything I do is projectretainer based.
So I think, um, that's what Ilook for.
I look for organizations thatare looking to get a more pure
definition of how to do the jobof sales.
Right.
And if you're committed to that,a guy like me is who you want to
(08:02):
bring in.
Play the King (08:03):
Right.
You wouldn't hire an HR personand say like, all right, we're
gonna pay you based on right.
How many, like if our, if ourretention rate goes on, people
Kevin Hopp (08:10):
Stick ground.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
Exactly interesting.
And a lot of that, a lot of thatis like unhealthy culture around
sales.
We're seeing this today, likeI'm seeing this right now in,
you know, companies justslashing their sales
departments, layoffs are goingleft.
Right.
And sideways man on LinkedIn,it's just a it's doom and gloom
on there.
(08:30):
Uh, companies are with therecession.
I pending recession and marketscrashing and stuff like that.
People are just laying off thesales team.
because it's like, well, wecould always hire some more
people that want to hunt forcommission next time around.
So right.
I think the companies to finallyanswer your question is what,
what do companies, whatdifferentiates the company to
get sales, right?
(08:51):
Is they focus on the process,right?
And this is, this is so true.
I mean, John wooden talks aboutthis a lot, you know, the, the
greatest speakers of our timehave talked about don't be
obsessed with the outcome, beobsessed with the process.
You know what I mean?
Kobe Bryant was big on this.
The whole idea of like, I gottamake a thousand free throws in
practice so that when I go tothe game, it's no big deal.
(09:13):
Like a lot of companies tend tosay like, I need revenue.
I need as fast as possible.
Ah, hurry up, close, close,close, Hey, Kevin, it's been
three weeks.
Where's on my pipeline.
You know, an attitude like that,the companies that get sales
right are obsessed with creatinga process over time that will
produce reliable results, butyou gotta be patient.
(09:34):
It's just like any otherdiscipline and it's not coin
operated.
Play the King (09:38):
Yeah.
That's great.
So that process is some mix Iwould assume of technology and,
you know, best practices, justlike, you know, the motions,
maybe just like discipline tostick with it too, but like
break those down for me.
Like what are some of the keytechnologies,key sort of
practices that you wouldimplement when you go into and
maybe we keep it high level,because I'm sure that each of
(09:59):
your clients is a littledifferent, right?
So, but what are some of themajor things you, you tend to
see across companies that theyneed, you know, for you to
implement.
Kevin Hopp (10:06):
So it's, it's three areas, right?
And it's the same three areasthat a lot of consultants talk
about.
I hear it a lot, but I also havean echo chamber right around me,
of people like me.
But the three areas that I helppeople focus on really is
process, technology and people,all three of those are really
(10:27):
important, right?
So you can, you can kind of sayit, the, the right order, in my
opinion is technology first,right?
Beause we want to be able to domore with less.
And particularly this is a majorkey here, particularly in
today's market.
If your company is trying tobuild a serious go to market
function and you just lean onsales people to do the old
fashioned quote unquote elbowgrease of picking up the phone,
(10:50):
10 digits at a time, or huntingfor email addresses one on one
online, somewhere like if you'renot investing in a technology
stack, you're not gonna retaintalent.
Okay.
So we build the technology stackfor an efficient operation, but
we all know the biggest problemwith software is vaporware.
The idea of, I get sold a billof goods.
(11:10):
I buy the software.
It's expensive.
No one ever really uses it toits potential.
So what I do is I help I say, Icall my shot.
I say, Hey, you use theseplatforms.
Here's how we're gonna use them.
Here's my entire like user guideas to how I help teams get these
platforms to sing and work.
And then we train the personbecause there, there is an
(11:31):
element of sales in particularwhere the performer matters,
right?
I saw top gun last night, but,and not to give it away for
anybody, no spoilers.
But the, the big line in top gunis, it's not the plane It's the
pilot.
That's my same pitch for salestechnology.
Right.
It's not the plane it's thepilot.
(11:51):
Yeah.
You can go buy all the excellenttech stuff.
But if you don't have, uh, a repthat understands how to have
those customer conversations anda rep that understands how to
operate the tech in general,it's not gonna work out very
well.
Right.
So it's people,process andtechnology and that's what the
magic of Hopp Consulting Group.
I help people blend those in away that actually works.
(12:13):
How do I know I've done it, done it a bunch.
Right.
Play the King (12:16):
Right, right, right.
Yeah.
So make this, make this a littlebit more concrete for us.
Like what, what is a generalprocess for this?
Like, you know, you start withmaybe prospecting, right?
You find the people you want tocall, then you call them, then
you, then you, what?
Like, and if I get the first twothings wrong, like, or it starts
before the prospecting, liketell me that too.
Like what are the steps?
What are the major steps here?
Kevin Hopp (12:36):
The major steps are you have to have a place to keep
track of who you're reaching outto when and what you said, which
is a CRM, right?
I don't know many people thatskip that step, which is good
news, right?
So you gotta have a CRM.
You want to try and build yourtech stack around the customer
record because at the end of theday, the most sustainable thing
(12:57):
you can do for long term growthis to respect the customer
experience.
And the customer experiencestarts the minute that you
decide you want to sell to them.
It doesn't start the day thatthey become a customer.
Because if they're gettingspammy emails or, you know, bunk
emails, or they're getting lotsof cold calls that are not
effective all the problems thattend to happen with poorly
(13:20):
trained sales teams, then theybecome worse customers.
They're not happy, or they neverbecome a customer.
Right.
Mm-hmm so CRM first, data is really important.
A lot of people tend to go cheapon data.
What I mean by data is prospectdata.
Like I want George's cell phonenumber.
I don't want Georgia's wife'scell phone number.
So if we get a CRM, we invest ina data source to get relatively
(13:43):
accurate data.
Then we need a productivitytool.
The sales acceleration space isbigger than ever, right?
And, and I'm talking theoutreach, I'm talking sales
loft, I'm talking, Zant, I'mtalking outplay, I'm talking
Apollo.
I can go on and on and on.
There are all these platformsthat are designed to help a
salesperson, take a prospectthrough a buying journey from,
(14:05):
okay, I wanna sell to George.
I'm gonna put George in thissequence where I, as a
salesperson, I'm gonna measuremy productivity.
And every day when I log in, itsays, okay, cool.
You called George yesterday.
Send him an email today.
Okay.
You emailed them yesterday, sendhim a LinkedIn message today.
Like it helps you stayproductive.
Mm-hmm I can'tstress this enough.
Like maybe this is the biggesttakeaway of this point is if you
(14:26):
aren't using technology forsales, acceleration around
productivity, you are losing in 2022 sales
engagementTech is the standard.
You need this stuff.
I don't work with clients thataren't committed to buying this
stuff.
Mm-hmm, it's just,it's becoming table stakes.
It's as essential as CRM, youknow, the CRM had the same
(14:48):
revolution in the early twothousands, where are like, holy
cow, we need to buy Salesforce.
Like, what is this?
How do we even use this?
You know,.
Yeah.
So that, that is my, my bigtakeaway there.
And then, you know, once youhave those base layers laid
down, we need to establish amessaging strategy and a, and a
base go to market.
Right.
Play the King (15:08):
You know, I, I guess I I'd be curious, you
know, you, you mentioned, yousaid cold calling and, and I
wonder if you meant thatliterally, like, are, is it
always a phone call or, youknow, I guess the larger
question here is, in what wayshave, you know, technology and
the, the way we live these dayschanged the methods you use to
reach out to people.
And, and where do you see itgoing from here?
Like what, what is the futureof, of outbound selling?
Kevin Hopp (15:31):
Well, that's a big question.
So, uh, so technology hasmade a salesperson's life a
hundred times easier.
Now, why is that?
Because in the, let's say theyears, 2003, 2005, whatever, I'm
gonna have to look someone up, Imight have some, you know,
rudimentary type database CRM,then I'm gonna call their number
(15:55):
that I find by hand becausedialing tech, wasn't a big deal
then.
And this whole time, I don'treally have a way to visualize
what this person looks like,what they might care about, you
know, where they went to school,you know, where they, what,
where, where was their last jobthat's called LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is the Biblefor sales people.
(16:15):
It is the essential, thegreatest gift that sales people
have ever gotten.
Because at the end of the day,in the most rudimentary form,
sales is people selling topeople and trust is sales.
People do not buy for people.
They don't trust.
You can't get someone's trust.
They don't know you.
And they that's.
(16:36):
The biggest barrier to outboundsales is they don't know you
from Adam.
They don't know who you are.
So with LinkedIn, we get achance to create a personal
brand, to create an image, tocreate a, Hey look, I'm a real
person, just like you.
I have thoughts, feelings,family.
Don't be rude.
You can trust me.
We went to the same school.
We like the same things.
We have the same sort ofopinions.
(16:57):
So LinkedIn is really critical.
But the other important part toyour question about the future
of outbound sales, well, geez,it is getting harder and harder
every day.
And the biggest tech companiesin the world are actively
working day in and day out tomake outbound sales harder.
Apple has a feature that the,your iPhone will not ring.
(17:20):
If I'm not already in youraddress book, that kills me.
that kills everybody,right?
That kills anybody.
That's trying to do cold callingGoogle.
And, uh, apple also have emailfeatures that anonymize your
emails and create burner emailswithin seconds to get lead forms
and other things like that.
So you never, you can start to,to be much more anonymous as you
(17:42):
go around the world and makes itharder to tell who might be
interested in things.
So all that to say it's gettingharder and harder, which means
it's gonna take more attempts.
Now, call it an email, call it aLinkedIn connect, call it a
phone call, more attempts perperson to get the same
conversion rate over time.
(18:03):
Like that is the definition ofharder for outbound sales.
So like the big blanket messagethere is you have to have
technology and process to levelup against this.
Otherwise you're simply gonna beplaying a losing game, right?
If you're not using an autodialer, you're gonna lose.
If you're not using technologyto cleanse your domain, use
(18:26):
proxy domains, warm up yourinbox, do email deliverability
the right way you're gonna lose.
So that's, that's kind of the,and it it's happening today, but
it's only gonna get worse.
Play the King (18:38):
Yeah.
It makes me think about lastweek I got an email from someone
and it said, Hey, first name in the subject line.
Then I was like their usingtechnology, but like, you're
trying to, you're moving toofast.
Maybe, you're trying to hit morenames per minute than, you know,
because it's harder.
Kevin Hopp (18:53):
Oh, I promise you, there was a sales trip by the
end of that, that went Duh, youknow, like, gosh, darn it.
I hit send on the campaignbefore I had it flushed out.
So you feel bad, but
Play the King (19:05):
Yep.
Yep.
This is great.
Uh, tell us a little bit aboutyour podcast.
I want to give you a chance toplug that and tell people where
they can find it and where theycan find more information about
Hopp consulting group.
Um, because you know, I, I thinkman, just everything, you know,
I, I imagine that working withyou, I've not worked with you
is, is very, very useful.
You, you also have just a ton ofton of content out there.
And so, you know, which I, whichI imagine is part of a, a
(19:25):
healthy, you know, healthy salespipeline.
So, tell us where to get intoyour top of funnel.
Basically.
Kevin Hopp (19:31):
Absolutely.
So LinkedIn is the number oneplace.
Like I mentioned, I'm build, I'mpretty committed to building a,
a nice personal brand there.
I have a podcast where I'm, I'mgenerally just obsessed with
people's stories.
I think there's a world where Iwant to be Joe Rogan one day,
like Joe, Rogan's got the bestjob of all time, his podcast.
He literally just takes cool.
(19:52):
People, sits down with them andtalks for hours and, and people
listen to every minute of it.
So like, that's my dream job.
, I'm a psychology majorin school.
I'm fascinated by people.
So my podcast is called thesales career podcast.
If you're in sales, it will bevaluable for you period, full
stop.
It's it's really interestingstuff from some of the, the
(20:13):
brightest minds and leaders insales technology and in the SaaS
space, very specificallysoftware space.
So highly recommend you checkthat out.
You can go toHoppconsultinggroup.com if you
want to learn more about myservices.
I have an online course that I'mabout to launch.
And we mentioned cold calling afew times here I am a cold
(20:33):
calling freak.
I'm all about it.
And I am launching a coursecalled cold calling 1 0 1.
So this is everything you needto know to have a modern
approach to outbound coldcalling so that it produces.
And so that it is something thatyou don't hate.
Like that's my, my big missionstatement with the course is
cold calling sucks.
I'm trying to help it, help youmake it suck less, right?
(20:56):
So that course is, is reallyfoundational knowledge.
I give it all away.
It's 49 bucks, check it out.
Play the King (21:02):
Got it.
And that is on your landingpage.
I'm looking at it right now.
And, so you can go and log inand sign up to get started.
So very easy.
Kevin, this is really useful.
Thank you for the time today.
We really enjoyed hearing abouthow you do what you do.
Kevin Hopp (21:16):
Thank you.
I appreciate you having me on!
This podcast is sponsored by OMI.
The company that makes CRM work!Today's guest is Kevin Hopp CEO
of Hopp Consulting Group.
So Kevin, welcome to thepodcast.
I would like to start just byasking you about Hopp Consulting
Group, obviously, the autonomousconsulting group.
(00:20):
What do you do?
Who do you serve?
I'm familiar with your podcast,which is excellent, but let's
assume that the people listeningare not, tell us about yourself.
Kevin Hopp (00:28):
Sure thing.
Yeah, my name's Kevin Hopp.
I run my own small consultingbusiness and I make sure to say
the word small, because I amvery committed to being a solo
entrepreneur for at least thenext year and a half.
So all my clients get my time.
Why is my time important?
Why would they work with me?
So I, I work exclusively withearly stage and late, early
(00:50):
stage tech companies.
So my experience in the workingworld has all been with early
stage tech companies.
So I've been the first hire in abusiness four different times.
Three of those were softwarecompanies.
So I've always been the only guyin the room when the founder
looks around and says, who arewe gonna sell to?
How are we gonna do this?
(01:10):
Like what's our go to marketlook like?
So I've had to do that so manytimes that now I have a passion
for doing it the right way forearly stage technology
companies.
And I do feel like, I'veunlocked a bit of a cheat code
here.
The idea of if you have capitaland you want to go talk to your
(01:32):
market, you want to get net newconversations going.
I really Excel at building thosesoftware systems, like a
technology stack with a wholeprocess around why building it
that way with the whole processaround how we use that
technology stack to generate netnew business for tech startups.
So the shortest way to say it isI do outbound sales consulting.
(01:54):
The longest way to say it is,I'm a cold calling geek with a
lot of really specificexperience.
I only work with tech companiescommitted to growth!
Play the King (02:04):
And this may be obvious, but most of your
clients, I assume, are B2Bcompanies, right?
Kevin Hopp (02:08):
Yeah.
That's all my experience.
So a hundred percent of myexperience is B2B.
And I only work with B2Bcompanies because I know that
motion very, very well.
Uh, The bottom line of mymethodology, I call it
conversation first.
So I'm all about cold calling,the way I tell that story is
making what is old new again,you know, the rise of the silent
(02:31):
sales floor, the rise of sales,automation, sales, enablement,
marketing, all that's really,really great.
If your company invests inmarketing the right way, you
might not have to do a lot ofthat ice cold outbound motion.
But the founders that work withme work with me because they
say, shoot, you're right.
Like my sales floor is quiet.
My sales reps don't know how totalk the talk because they spend
(02:52):
all their time taking orders andwe need to go make it happen for
ourselves.
And that is not easy.
Right?
Cold calling is not anybody'sfavorite thing.
And I, I know that and Iacknowledge that and I make it
suck less!
Play the King (03:05):
questions about, your businessand, who you guys help and, why
companies come to you.
But I'm curious about just yourbackground real quick.
You know, it sounds like youspecialize in going from like
zero to best friends, right.
Or at least that's the goal withwhoever you're calling at, what
age did you figure out?
Okay, I'm an extrovert I'm verygood at insinuating myself or
(03:27):
being charming or, you know,just the skills that, that it
takes to be somebody who can geton the phone with somebody who
doesn't know who you are and,and then have them sort of
eating out of your hand in thenext five minutes.
Kevin Hopp (03:39):
That's wow.
Really good question.
are good at outbound sales andmost like people that end up
kind of in sales, we are thekids that growing up, like your
parents and your friends andpeople would be like, man, you
should be a lawyer.
(04:01):
the way you get what you wantall the time.
You should be a lawyer.
And then like the kids that endup in sales are the ones that
don't like school
I didn't like school.
I graduated with a four yeardegree, but man, I didn't,
didn't turn around.
As I walked out the door, I waslike, all right, I'm out, I'm
done with school.
But, I noticed that I had thegift of the gab.
(04:21):
It took me until my workingyears.
I thought sales was a dirtyword.
I, you gotta understand like mybackground though, like my
father, was a PhD in mechanicalengineering, my mother was a
stay at home Mom.
I didn't know any sales people.
Like I knew nobody that was asales person.
The only person I knew growingup that was a salesperson was my
friend's dad.
And what I knew was that he gotlaid off every few years and
(04:44):
like that he was constantlywithout a job.
And like my family didn't talkpositively about that.
Interesting.
Like, oh yeah, Bob got laid offagain.
Mm-hmm
So when I got into college, Idid some internships.
I realized in the working world,like I interned at this company
called Invoca, they raised$30million.
(05:05):
It was a tech startup indowntown Santa Barbara.
That felt like Silicon valley.
It was really, really cool.
Mm-hmm
energy in the office was in thesales corner, right.
Where the 10 sales people wereand they were doing demos and
banging gongs and all thatstuff.
And then I, I was doing acustomer success internship with
account management.
(05:25):
And I was like, dude, I amclicking in a spreadsheet all
day and sitting quietly in anoffice while someone talking on
a Polycom to a customer about aproblem.
And I'm looking out the glassdoor of the office, like leaning
over at the sales pick, going,God, that looks fun.
You know?
And then I just have that kindof high energy attitude.
(05:46):
So long story short, you know,my first job out of college was
I was the first hire at astartup.
I was the first hire, so I gotto do everything.
But then I noticed right awaythat I'm like, oh wow.
A lot of people struggle withsales.
They struggle with this.
And they, they are just notlike, oh man, cold calling.
No way.
I'm like, yeah, I don't care.
I'll call them, sure you tell methere's money in it for me.
Let's go.
Play the King (06:07):
talked about, you know, sort ofin your family sales, having a
bad rap, you know, it feels likeit was just, you know, not
appreciated the, the importanceof it right.
In, in a, in a business like cuzcuz in, in certain businesses,
salesmen are like the, you know,they're the, the, the fighter
pilots, right?
They're the, the golden boys.
Um, what, uh, you know, talk tome about businesses that get
(06:30):
this right?
Who, who, what do they, what dothey understand about needing
this role to really be sort oflike acing it for them?
Kevin Hopp (06:36):
That's a great question.
It's kind of a,I mean, there's,there's, there's two little
answers there.
I think one of the answers is,you know, my, my perspective of
sales growing up came from notknowing any sales people, right?
Like, and my dad as an engineer,loathed sales people, because he
never had to deal with them.
And when he did, it was like fora big project he's working on
and then he hated it.
(06:56):
Right.
Mm-hmm
But as I've seen in myconsulting work and in the first
few, first six years of mycareer, when I was working w
twos, there, there tends to be alack of respect in general,
around sales that, thatsalespeople are a dime a dozen
or that salespeople are onlycoin operated.
Right.
Like I, I have, I think Umbridgewith that idea too.
Uh, when I tell people that I'ma sales consultant, a lot of
(07:19):
people will say, oh cool, well,I'd be happy to hire you
commission only mm-hmm
whoa, no, I'm a consultant inthat.
I teach process, structure andstrategy at the same level as
your, you know, projectmanagement consultant, the same
level as your engineeringconsultant, where it's very
strategic and my knowledge iswhat you are buying mm-hmm
So I, I'm not coin operated.
(07:40):
I don't work commission only.
And I, I actually really,haven't made straight commission
in probably three years, three,four years.
Everything I do is projectretainer based.
So I think, um, that's what Ilook for.
I look for organizations thatare looking to get a more pure
definition of how to do the jobof sales.
Right.
And if you're committed to that,a guy like me is who you want to
(08:02):
bring in.
Play the King (08:03):
Right.
You wouldn't hire an HR personand say like, all right, we're
gonna pay you based on right.
How many, like if our, if ourretention rate goes on, people
Kevin Hopp (08:10):
Stick ground.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
Exactly interesting.
And a lot of that, a lot of thatis like unhealthy culture around
sales.
We're seeing this today, likeI'm seeing this right now in,
you know, companies justslashing their sales
departments, layoffs are goingleft.
Right.
And sideways man on LinkedIn,it's just a it's doom and gloom
on there.
(08:30):
Uh, companies are with therecession.
I pending recession and marketscrashing and stuff like that.
People are just laying off thesales team.
because it's like, well, wecould always hire some more
people that want to hunt forcommission next time around.
So right.
I think the companies to finallyanswer your question is what,
what do companies, whatdifferentiates the company to
get sales, right?
(08:51):
Is they focus on the process,right?
And this is, this is so true.
I mean, John wooden talks aboutthis a lot, you know, the, the
greatest speakers of our timehave talked about don't be
obsessed with the outcome, beobsessed with the process.
You know what I mean?
Kobe Bryant was big on this.
The whole idea of like, I gottamake a thousand free throws in
practice so that when I go tothe game, it's no big deal.
(09:13):
Like a lot of companies tend tosay like, I need revenue.
I need as fast as possible.
Ah, hurry up, close, close,close, Hey, Kevin, it's been
three weeks.
Where's on my pipeline.
You know, an attitude like that,the companies that get sales
right are obsessed with creatinga process over time that will
produce reliable results, butyou gotta be patient.
(09:34):
It's just like any otherdiscipline and it's not coin
operated.
Play the King (09:38):
Yeah.
That's great.
So that process is some mix Iwould assume of technology and,
you know, best practices, justlike, you know, the motions,
maybe just like discipline tostick with it too, but like
break those down for me.
Like what are some of the keytechnologies,key sort of
practices that you wouldimplement when you go into and
maybe we keep it high level,because I'm sure that each of
(09:59):
your clients is a littledifferent, right?
So, but what are some of themajor things you, you tend to
see across companies that theyneed, you know, for you to
implement.
Kevin Hopp (10:06):
So it's, it's three areas, right?
And it's the same three areasthat a lot of consultants talk
about.
I hear it a lot, but I also havean echo chamber right around me,
of people like me.
But the three areas that I helppeople focus on really is
process, technology and people,all three of those are really
(10:27):
important, right?
So you can, you can kind of sayit, the, the right order, in my
opinion is technology first,right?
Beause we want to be able to domore with less.
And particularly this is a majorkey here, particularly in
today's market.
If your company is trying tobuild a serious go to market
function and you just lean onsales people to do the old
fashioned quote unquote elbowgrease of picking up the phone,
(10:50):
10 digits at a time, or huntingfor email addresses one on one
online, somewhere like if you'renot investing in a technology
stack, you're not gonna retaintalent.
Okay.
So we build the technology stackfor an efficient operation, but
we all know the biggest problemwith software is vaporware.
The idea of, I get sold a billof goods.
(11:10):
I buy the software.
It's expensive.
No one ever really uses it toits potential.
So what I do is I help I say, Icall my shot.
I say, Hey, you use theseplatforms.
Here's how we're gonna use them.
Here's my entire like user guideas to how I help teams get these
platforms to sing and work.
And then we train the personbecause there, there is an
(11:31):
element of sales in particularwhere the performer matters,
right?
I saw top gun last night, but,and not to give it away for
anybody, no spoilers.
But the, the big line in top gunis, it's not the plane It's the
pilot.
That's my same pitch for salestechnology.
Right.
It's not the plane it's thepilot.
(11:51):
Yeah.
You can go buy all the excellenttech stuff.
But if you don't have, uh, a repthat understands how to have
those customer conversations anda rep that understands how to
operate the tech in general,it's not gonna work out very
well.
Right.
So it's people,process andtechnology and that's what the
magic of Hopp Consulting Group.
I help people blend those in away that actually works.
(12:13):
How do I know I've done it,
Right.
Play the King (12:16):
Right, right, right.
Yeah.
So make this, make this a littlebit more concrete for us.
Like what, what is a generalprocess for this?
Like, you know, you start withmaybe prospecting, right?
You find the people you want tocall, then you call them, then
you, then you, what?
Like, and if I get the first twothings wrong, like, or it starts
before the prospecting, liketell me that too.
Like what are the steps?
What are the major steps here?
Kevin Hopp (12:36):
The major steps are you have to have a place to keep
track of who you're reaching outto when and what you said, which
is a CRM, right?
I don't know many people thatskip that step, which is good
news, right?
So you gotta have a CRM.
You want to try and build yourtech stack around the customer
record because at the end of theday, the most sustainable thing
(12:57):
you can do for long term growthis to respect the customer
experience.
And the customer experiencestarts the minute that you
decide you want to sell to them.
It doesn't start the day thatthey become a customer.
Because if they're gettingspammy emails or, you know, bunk
emails, or they're getting lotsof cold calls that are not
effective all the problems thattend to happen with poorly
(13:20):
trained sales teams, then theybecome worse customers.
They're not happy, or they neverbecome a customer.
Right.
Mm-hmm
A lot of people tend to go cheapon data.
What I mean by data is prospectdata.
Like I want George's cell phonenumber.
I don't want Georgia's wife'scell phone number.
So if we get a CRM, we invest ina data source to get relatively
(13:43):
accurate data.
Then we need a productivitytool.
The sales acceleration space isbigger than ever, right?
And, and I'm talking theoutreach, I'm talking sales
loft, I'm talking, Zant, I'mtalking outplay, I'm talking
Apollo.
I can go on and on and on.
There are all these platformsthat are designed to help a
salesperson, take a prospectthrough a buying journey from,
(14:05):
okay, I wanna sell to George.
I'm gonna put George in thissequence where I, as a
salesperson, I'm gonna measuremy productivity.
And every day when I log in, itsays, okay, cool.
You called George yesterday.
Send him an email today.
Okay.
You emailed them yesterday, sendhim a LinkedIn message today.
Like it helps you stayproductive.
Mm-hmm
Like maybe this is the biggesttakeaway of this point is if you
(14:26):
aren't using technology forsales, acceleration around
productivity, you are losing
engagementTech is the standard.
You need this stuff.
I don't work with clients thataren't committed to buying this
stuff.
Mm-hmm
It's as essential as CRM, youknow, the CRM had the same
(14:48):
revolution in the early twothousands, where are like, holy
cow, we need to buy Salesforce.
Like, what is this?
How do we even use this?
You know,
Yeah.
So that, that is my, my bigtakeaway there.
And then, you know, once youhave those base layers laid
down, we need to establish amessaging strategy and a, and a
base go to market.
Right.
Play the King (15:08):
You know, I, I guess I I'd be curious, you
know, you, you mentioned, yousaid cold calling and, and I
wonder if you meant thatliterally, like, are, is it
always a phone call or, youknow, I guess the larger
question here is, in what wayshave, you know, technology and
the, the way we live these dayschanged the methods you use to
reach out to people.
And, and where do you see itgoing from here?
Like what, what is the futureof, of outbound selling?
Kevin Hopp (15:31):
Well, that's a big question.
So
hundred times easier.
Now, why is that?
Because in the, let's say theyears, 2003, 2005, whatever, I'm
gonna have to look someone up, Imight have some, you know,
rudimentary type database CRM,then I'm gonna call their number
(15:55):
that I find by hand becausedialing tech, wasn't a big deal
then.
And this whole time, I don'treally have a way to visualize
what this person looks like,what they might care about, you
know, where they went to school,you know, where they, what,
where, where was their last jobthat's called LinkedIn.
(16:15):
It is the essential, thegreatest gift that sales people
have ever gotten.
Because at the end of the day,in the most rudimentary form,
sales is people selling topeople and trust is sales.
People do not buy for people.
They don't trust.
You can't get someone's trust.
They don't know you.
And they that's.
(16:36):
The biggest barrier to outboundsales is they don't know you
from Adam.
They don't know who you are.
So with LinkedIn, we get achance to create a personal
brand, to create an image, tocreate a, Hey look, I'm a real
person, just like you.
I have thoughts, feelings,family.
Don't be rude.
You can trust me.
We went to the same school.
We like the same things.
We have the same sort ofopinions.
(16:57):
So LinkedIn is really critical.
But the other important part toyour question about the future
of outbound sales, well, geez,it is getting harder and harder
every day.
And the biggest tech companiesin the world are actively
working day in and day out tomake outbound sales harder.
Apple has a feature that the,your iPhone will not ring.
(17:20):
If I'm not already in youraddress book, that kills me.
That kills anybody.
That's trying to do cold callingGoogle.
And, uh, apple also have emailfeatures that anonymize your
emails and create burner emailswithin seconds to get lead forms
and other things like that.
So you never, you can start to,to be much more anonymous as you
(17:42):
go around the world and makes itharder to tell who might be
interested in things.
So all that to say it's gettingharder and harder, which means
it's gonna take more attempts.
Now, call it an email, call it aLinkedIn connect, call it a
phone call, more attempts perperson to get the same
conversion rate over time.
(18:03):
Like that is the definition ofharder for outbound sales.
So like the big blanket messagethere is you have to have
technology and process to levelup against this.
Otherwise you're simply gonna beplaying a losing game, right?
If you're not using an autodialer, you're gonna lose.
If you're not using technologyto cleanse your domain, use
(18:26):
proxy domains, warm up yourinbox, do email deliverability
the right way you're gonna lose.
So that's, that's kind of the,and it it's happening today, but
it's only gonna get worse.
Play the King (18:38):
Yeah.
It makes me think about lastweek I got an email from someone
and it said, Hey, first name
Then I was like their usingtechnology, but like, you're
trying to, you're moving toofast.
Maybe, you're trying to hit morenames per minute than, you know,
because it's harder.
Kevin Hopp (18:53):
Oh, I promise you, there was a sales trip by the
end of that, that went Duh, youknow, like, gosh, darn it.
I hit send on the campaignbefore I had it flushed out.
So you feel bad, but
Play the King (19:05):
Yep.
Yep.
This is great.
Uh, tell us a little bit aboutyour podcast.
I want to give you a chance toplug that and tell people where
they can find it and where theycan find more information about
Hopp consulting group.
Um, because you know, I, I thinkman, just everything, you know,
I, I imagine that working withyou, I've not worked with you
is, is very, very useful.
You, you also have just a ton ofton of content out there.
And so, you know, which I, whichI imagine is part of a, a
(19:25):
healthy, you know, healthy salespipeline.
So, tell us where to get intoyour top of funnel.
Basically.
Kevin Hopp (19:31):
Absolutely.
So LinkedIn is the number oneplace.
Like I mentioned, I'm build, I'mpretty committed to building a,
a nice personal brand there.
I have a podcast where I'm, I'mgenerally just obsessed with
people's stories.
I think there's a world where Iwant to be Joe Rogan one day,
like Joe, Rogan's got the bestjob of all time, his podcast.
He literally just takes cool.
(19:52):
People, sits down with them andtalks for hours and, and people
listen to every minute of it.
So like, that's my dream job.
I'm fascinated by people.
So my podcast is called thesales career podcast.
If you're in sales, it will bevaluable for you period, full
stop.
It's it's really interestingstuff from some of the, the
(20:13):
brightest minds and leaders insales technology and in the SaaS
space, very specificallysoftware space.
So highly recommend you checkthat out.
You can go toHoppconsultinggroup.com if you
want to learn more about myservices.
I have an online course that I'mabout to launch.
And we mentioned cold calling afew times here I am a cold
(20:33):
calling freak.
I'm all about it.
And I am launching a coursecalled cold calling 1 0 1.
So this is everything you needto know to have a modern
approach to outbound coldcalling so that it produces.
And so that it is something thatyou don't hate.
Like that's my, my big missionstatement with the course is
cold calling sucks.
I'm trying to help it, help youmake it suck less, right?
(20:56):
So that course is, is reallyfoundational knowledge.
I give it all away.
It's 49 bucks, check it out.
Play the King (21:02):
Got it.
And that is on your landingpage.
I'm looking at it right now.
And, so you can go and log inand sign up to get started.
So very easy.
Kevin, this is really useful.
Thank you for the time today.
We really enjoyed hearing abouthow you do what you do.
Kevin Hopp (21:16):
Thank you.
I appreciate you having me on!
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