David Dember was the top Enterprise Sales Development Representative at Sendoso until just very recently when he was promoted to Team Lead of Enterprise Sales Development. Sendoso the leading Sending Platform, helps companies stand out by giving them new ways to engage with customers throughout the buyer’s journey. David has a sustained record of success of delivering smart solutions and impressive profit growth through the development and implementation of comprehensive long and short-term business strategies. He is a self-motivated, highly adaptable solutions architect dedicated to creating win-win strategies for high growth organizations.
In this episode, David shares his sales origin story, which includes a passion for sales that dates back to his elementary school days. David lives his life with a ‘Beast Mode’ mindset. For David, this means leaving everything on the field, focusing intensely on his craft, and outworking every salesperson in the room. David values putting his head down and his blinders on in order to hyper-focus on the task at hand. It’s not merely about making quota, but rather crushing it, which is why David has averaged over 150% quota over Q2 and Q3 at Sendoso. Overall, David is a very deliberate seller who is determined to exceed expectations and demonstrate excellence in his craft.
David continues to expound on the importance of personalization and the strategies he implements while prospecting. He shares the three things he attributes to his success, including paying close attention to detail, his daily personal affirmation and setting up strong sales cadences and sequences. One such sequence that David follows is the BAGELS Process, which he shares with the audience. David also speaks to the proudest accomplishment of his career which is the fact that he’s stayed true to his brand and what he believes in and that he never took ‘no’ for an answer. Finally, David issues an actionable challenge to the audience. While there is no hard and fast rule, he highlights the importance of being able to listen, absorb as much as possible, engage with senior leaders to try to understand their challenges and pain points, and understand how to better yourself. By doing this, you will have made the process your own and will see significant results.
What We Covered:
00:24 – Scott welcomes today’s guest, David Dember
01:12 – The top three things David attributes to his sales success
01:22 – Number 1: Paying close attention to detail
01:59 – Number 2: Daily affirmation
02:40 – Number 3: Setting up strong sales cadences and sequences
04:19 – How David differentiates himself as a salesperson
06:34 – David shares his seasoned approach to starting a sales relationship while maintaining a personalized cadence
09:31 – David’s career path and trajectory at Sendoso
10:38 – David shares his sales origin story
15:33 – What David would have liked to know earlier in his sales career
17:00 – David’s favorite sales story
19:47 – David’s proudest accomplishment
20:23 – Obstacles and challenges David has had to overcome throughout his career
21:36 – How David overcame the biggest tragedy of his life
23:44 – The importance David places on mindset and how he manages his personal mindset
26:01 – What David does specifically to fuel his internal fire
27:31 – David’s daily rituals and routines, including his BAGEL process
31:58 – How David utilizes voicemail as a tool during prospecting
33:35 – The statistics that David tracks for his own sales success and the processes he follows to achieve such solid results
37:11 – David describes a typical day in the life
43:06 – The books, news, podcasts and trade information that David consumes
45:33 – How David focuses his prospecting efforts and how he cycles new strategies
50:45 – Tools and apps that David uses on a daily basis
52:36 – The specific sales philosophy David subscribes to
53:39 – David’s sales style
55:41 – David speaks to how he altered his sales approach in the midst of Covid-19
58:14 – One of David’s beliefs that the average SDR would think is crazy
1:00:43 – An average SDR’s belief that David thinks is crazy
1:02:29 – Advice David would give to an upstart salesperson
1:06:31 – David’s actionable challenge to the audience
Tweetables:
“Overall, it’s trying to get the prospect to laugh. If I notice that you have a really funny sense of humor, I’m looking for those things on LinkedIn. I’m seeing what you laughed at, specifically. It’s almost like the saying, ‘Two friends at a bar.’ If somebody goes to a bar and they see five friends there that are laughing and I’m sitting on the other side of the bar, I want to understand what joke did they just make? How can I engage with them, because I can promise you, some of the folks at the other end of the bar are VPs of Marketing, VPs of Sales.” (08:45)
“I think sales really reminds me a lot about baseball. It’s all about statistics. You fail seven out of ten times in baseball, you go to the Hall of Fame.” (22:39)
“BAGELS Process for me is: Behaviors, Affirmations, Goals, Evaluations, Lessons, and Successes.” (28:56)
“I want people to know that every single month, I don’t care what it’s going to take, I’m going to not only hit quota, but I’m going to smash my number out of the ballpark. That’s not an exception. One hundred percent quota to me is as good as fifty percent quota. I’m not satisfied with one hundred percent quota; that’s a loss in my mind.” (33:57)
“It’s a lot of work to really understand it [David’s sales process], but my mind moves so quickly. I can process it in my mind and I already know my next plays. And, sometimes, it’s hard to regurgitate that and really explain it. It’s finding the ways that work best for you and I’ve figured out a science that works best for me.” (46:34)
“That’s really what I am a firm believer in, keeping short, concise and to the point. And then after you end up going in for the close, to keep your mouth shut to be able to let them process everything you just said.” (55:27)
“If you want to have a career in sales, you need to own this. You need to breathe this. It’s a glass of water in 118 degrees…You really have to be able to put those hours in, find what’s working and reach out to those senior leaders.” (59:23)
“It’s really about being courageous. Because if you can be courageous internally at your organization, it will give you the confidence to start reaching out to high level titles. And, you’ll be impressed with the type of results you can get by practicing what you preach at your current company.” (1:04:10)
Links Mentioned:
[email protected]
Sales Success Stories Podcast
2019 Sales Success Summit Videos
2020 Sales Success Summit
David Dember on LinkedIn
Shark Tank
Tools Mentioned:
Salesloft
Salesforce
Microsoft Outlook
Books Mentioned:
The Challenger Sale
You Can’t Teach a Kid to Ride a Bike at a Seminar: Sandler Training’s 7-Step System for Successful Selling
Way of the Wolf