6: Nuances in Revenue Operations and Sales Tech with UpKeep’s Jeff Ignacio

Nuances in Revenue Operations and Sales Tech with UpKeep’s Jeff Ignacio Episode Summary: Welcome to Sales Tech, the show that talks about sales technology, what’s working, what’s not, and where the industry is going. In this episode, Jeff Ignacio joins the show to discuss his background in Revenue Operations and trends he’s noticed in the sales tech industry. Jeff is the Head of Revenue and Growth Operations at UpKeep, the number one mobile-first computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) on the market. In his role, Jeff focuses primarily on aligning go-to-market strategy and works across a multitude of departments, including Sales, Marketing, and Customer Experience, to help grow companies. Today, Thom and Jeff discuss the explosion and subsequent consolidation of sales technology, Jeff’s P.E.A.S. acronym, and how sales professionals can better utilize sales technology. Jeff provides insights on the future of the industry, the importance of having business models in place, and the multiple ways of differentiating yourself as an organization. What We Covered: 00:36 – Thom introduces today’s guest, Jeff Ignacio who joins the show to discuss his background in Revenue Operations, his P.E.A.S. acronym, and trends he’s noticed in sales tech  03:47 – The Grocery Store Problem  05:19 – Jeff talks about the consolidation of sales tech and what he believes is and is not working in the industry today  08:12 – Jeff speaks to how sales professionals can better utilize sales tech  09:42 – Jeff expounds on his role at UpKeep  11:41 – Jeff discusses the nuances of working with the heads of Sales, Marketing and Customer Experience  12:55 – Jeff dissects his P.E.A.S. acronym as it pertains to sales technology  18:29 – Jeff stresses the importance of business models and systems  20:51 – What excites Jeff the most about the future of sales technology  22:13 – Final words of wisdom from Jeff  22:59 – Thom thanks Jeff for joining the show today Tweetables: “Revenue Operations is an interdisciplinary function where I believe it aligns both strategy and execution for go-to-market departments.” (01:30) “As a consumer and as a customer, I find [increased options in sales tech] as a good thing because it decreases price of the feature I’m about to buy. But as an owner or as an equity holder or as a revenue operator, I don’t like it very much because now it erodes some of the margin and the capability of what we’re trying to accomplish because there are so many more competitors in there.” (04:51) “Tools can be fairly flexible today. And so what you want to do is make sure that your process, even without the technology, is clean and cut and then the technology shifted around that. To me, that’s the ideal partnership between Operations and Sales.” (09:18) “The part that’s most valuable is not the tools or the technology or the systems in any Revenue Operations role. It’s really to sit down with those leaders to figure out what are the core objectives, what are the programs and the initiatives that we’re going to launch this year, where do we see fresh in-points and how can we mitigate those as seamlessly as possible.” (12:37) “Behind it all is this model. Just like any sales manager asking how many sales reps do I need, when do I need to hire them, and what role do I need to bring them in? That’s the model. The metric is how many sales reps do I have?” (19:05)   “How do you differentiate yourself? You can do it through superior product, obviously. You can do it through having a better customer experience. But where I work and where I figure out how to make companies better is figuring out what is that go-to-market motion, particularly for attracting customers and then selling to them and unlocking value.” (21:15) Links Mentioned: Jeff Ignacio on LinkedIn UpKeep’s Website  Looker  Tableau  HubSpot  Salesforce Google Analytics Thinking, Fast and Slow