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Using AI Agents for Enterprise Revenue (Greg Perotto and Jamie Schneiderman) · Unstuck Pod

• Jamie: Welcome, how you doing? Good. I'm glad that you're here. Thank you for joining me today. Appreciate it. For those ⁓ don't know you, ⁓ those who are watching, can you tell them about who you are, where you work, what you do, more about yourself? That would be great place to start. Greg Perotto: I'm great. Thanks, Jamie. Yeah, happy to. Thanks for inviting me on. I am the head of global marketing at Poggio which is an AI native company, which I'm sure we'll get into a little bit more later. I've been in marketing for, I don't know, 25 plus years. have been mostly in and B2B SaaS, ⁓ but have some time in ⁓ consumer like T-Mobile. And some of the brands on my resume that I've helped to build that I'm most proud ⁓ are ⁓ DocuSign, New of Poggio, T-Mobile, and ⁓ number of others. Jamie: So, it's awesome. Resume. So, let's hear more about, I mean, obviously a lot of the other names that you talk about, have heard of. So, tell everyone more about Poggio and how you got there, how long you've been there, et cetera. Greg Perotto: Yeah, I actually just passed my one year anniversary last week and it's amazing how time flies by. Poggio is a revenue super agent and AI agents power seller and agent success. So if you're a revenue leader, our platform, our AI and our agents help you identify. the best opportunities across your total addressable market, and then help you arm your team with tailored points of view, or what we call POVs, real-time account plans, and then the next best actions to close them. And we do that all inside your CRM. Jamie: And who are the customers that you're like, who are the folks that you're talking to that are like, I know you talked about CRO, you're on the revenue side, but like, who are the companies? What are they doing? Like, what does that look like? Greg Perotto: Yep. Yeah, I would say companies generally are large B2B enterprise organizations think. you know, at least 500, but more typically more than a thousand employees, typically more than a billion in revenue, though we have others that are ⁓ lower than that. And often have ⁓ really go to market motions. And that's usually come about from a mix of things. One, they've got really strong organic growth internally and a really strong sort of innovation machine around products, their platform, their services, their offering. They typically have pretty good ⁓ &A motions at that size, and so they're bringing in new companies, new products into their portfolio. They often have different overlays in their sales motion, so channel partners, and all of that creates a really complex selling environment. And when you're selling into ⁓ an ⁓ at large B2B enterprise organization, they expect you to show up smart. To show up knowing their business, knowing their challenges and their priorities, and there with solutions that solve them. Rather than showing up like a vendor selling a commodity ⁓ ⁓ even worse, saying, hey Jamie, what keeps you up at night? is the worst place to start your ⁓ pitch rather than going in deeply understanding your customers, knowing what are their priorities, what are their challenges, and how do you uniquely solve them so that you show up smarter than the competitors and you're poised to close deals and close them fast. Jamie: Yeah, I think like, yeah. Okay, so what I love about this is you're talking about a business that helps clients grow, right? And all the things that they need to grow. And what I wanna do is I really wanna dig in and talk to you about the things that you've done to help grow your business that's doing that. And ⁓ ⁓ me with some. So you've been around, you've been there for about a year, you said just past your year. Greg Perotto: Yeah, absolutely. Jamie: You know, I imagine that the sales cycles are long, as you, you know, complex sales cycles to sell into them, you know, how, where do you, where did you start? ⁓ were the things that either weren't happening or needed to happen at your end to really take you from where you were, to where you are and where you're going and, and maybe talk us through a little bit about where you're at on that journey. Greg Perotto: Yeah, well, I think it's a constant and continual evolution. There's probably not a week that's gone by in those 52 weeks that we haven't discussed our positioning and messaging as it relates to our own customers, priorities, challenges, and needs. And The reality is we're in a very nascent industry in technology with AI and generative AI. And it is fast changing. customers expect us to keep up. Keep up faster than they keep up so that we come to the table as experts in AI, as experts in go-to-market operations, and specifically as experts in revenue AI. And so Really understanding, like from day one, understanding our customers ⁓ and they're challenged with every day and how specifically we can help them solve those challenges. I mean, it's sort of like our product is built for that, right? So, I'm a big fan of the term dog fooding. I think of it as champagne-ing. So we, know, we champagne our own product every day because in order for us to show up smart like that. Jamie: Yes. You Greg Perotto: We have to deeply understand them. We have to understand their needs and we have to be able to talk about how we're solving those priorities and challenges. And what's interesting is, and you had asked earlier and I didn't really answer it, but what sort of got me to Poggio? You know, it was an executive recruiter from a very ⁓ highly regarded ⁓ marketing recruiting firm. And had sort of shared with me a little bit about the company. I knew I next wanted to go into ⁓ either or stay in sort of ⁓ governance, and compliance as a growing and sort of baseline vital industry. So the AI, know, my ears perked up and then they started me about what the company did. And of course we've evolved a little bit in that year or year and a half now since I first started talking with them. solves a problem that as a marketer, I've spent most of my career partnering with chief revenue officers and other revenue leaders to try and solve, which is how do you get all of your ⁓ to operate from the same sheet of music, if you will, about the customer. Ensuring that sheet of music tells you everything you need to know about the customer. And then also pulls in your... sales motion, your ICP or ideal customer profile, your solutions, your value frameworks and applies it against those customer challenges. And the reality is a seller can do that. They're often charged with doing that right before sales kickoff, particularly B2B sellers. They all rush to get that done. right before or at sales kickoff. And then a week later, they get put on a shelf when they get back from kickoff. And maybe they get referred to quarterly, but they're certainly not kept up to date, because the challenge is to do that kind of deep research for one account is hard. To do it across all of your accounts as a salesperson, you could have maybe 10 key accounts, maybe... You have a thousand accounts in your remit doing that across all of those accounts is impossible and keeping it up to date. So that if there's a change in the market or the competitors or the customer or your solutions, keeping that up to date. your account plans and your points of view are all up to date is not humanly possible. And it really wasn't only, it wasn't solvable until AI, like you, it is a machine scale problem to, to, to get all of that information from tens of thousands of sources. from your CRM or from Gong calls, ⁓ from ⁓ like 10Ks, ⁓ investor ⁓ transcripts calls, public websites, executives being quoted in the media, all of that stuff. comes together and our AI sort of sorts through and synthesizes it to understand what's the most important, cross-references it to make sure it's accurate, and really delivers that deep, deep understanding of your customer so that you show up really well prepared. And that's not something that was possible. And when the recruiter told me about it, I'm like, ⁓ my God, this is brilliant. Jamie: I want, so this is, this is interesting. You, you, you learn about this company, you go, ⁓ my God, these guys have something that I always wished I had. I, didn't, it was not possible before. This sounds incredible. So, so here's the piece I'm, curious about. So as you go to market, right, you say, this is a wow for me. This is a wow. Clearly, ⁓ you that there are people in these, in your prospects. that should feel the same way are do they find you do you find them ⁓ does that how does that start are they because are they looking forward and going where this is what we want and now we found you and this is amazing or are you knocking on the door ⁓ does that work right now ⁓ Greg Perotto: I think it's a mix. And I say that because certainly a year ago, I don't think a lot of organizations or revenue leaders knew exactly what they were looking for. And some still don't ⁓ because there is so much noise this AI universe and so many different things that you could employ that I think that for us be where they are, Jamie: Yeah. Yeah. Greg Perotto: whether it's at an event like dream force as an example, ⁓ for us to be able to talk with them their challenges and show them how we solve them. Like people's minds are blown when they are standing in front of a television screen at your booth and you're walking through a demo of how this, deep account intelligence shows up and populates an account plan inside Salesforce where they're trying to get their sellers to Jamie: Yeah. Greg Perotto: to sort of operate as their home screen in their day to day. ⁓ interesting thing for me is talking that evolution over that year, the stuff gets me excited ⁓ about where are today and where we're going, what I told you is maybe a fifth of it. And the reality is, I came into the organization, started talking with customers, I think that both the founders, Matt and Connor, sort of already envisioned this. But it clear to me. ⁓ ⁓ And to all of us, if you think about that challenge of aligning all of your sellers on the same sheet of music, think about that when it's all of your agents who are operating independent of your sellers. And if you don't give them the context they need about the customer and about the account, How are they going to take the right next action? So if you don't have something like Poggio as a baseline for intelligence and context about every one of your customers that's unified across your sellers and your agents to deliver that consistent world-class customer experience, I don't know how a go-to-market leader or revenue leader is effective in that world without something like Poggio Jamie: I get I think it's interesting. mentioned events. I'm poking and I'm poking because I'm trying to make sure ⁓ what I find most interesting from the folks I talked to one the AI space is they early on, they got a lot of people coming to them because everyone needs AI. need to be in on AI, I need to be on AI. And of course. ⁓ Greg Perotto: Yes, board mandates or CEO mandate. need to bring AI in to drive either revenue or efficiency or a combination. Jamie: Yeah. So you've got tailwind right there. That's, that's great. But at some point that's not meaningful and that doesn't, that's not going to work for you forever. It might get people in the door. You mentioned something fascinating around the wow that people have when you get them to a demo. So I'm at an event, you come by, you see the demo. Here's the piece I'm actually trying to get at. really just trying to circle in on, which is when I see a demo. I, so if I'm calling you about AI, I know I need AI. Okay. So I don't really know. I don't need to know exactly what you are. And I don't need to know where you fit in the market or relative to competitors necessarily at that point. need AI. if I see a demo, I can explain in my, to myself, what I, what I've just observed, I'm trying to fill the place in the middle. And I'm trying to understand how you're filling the place in the middle to be clear, ⁓ out. Greg Perotto: Right. Jamie: differentiate yourself and make sure that people know you for, no, no pogeo for something. So, so what's, what's that approach? How challenging. Greg Perotto: Yes. Well, so that absolutely starts with talking and listening to your customers, right? And understanding the challenges in their business, not just by using Poggio, but even just in having a conversation. What are they struggling with and how can you help them? And the reality is, whether it's AI or not AI and helping them, Are you actually solving a challenge they care about? Are you solving something that is interesting to them? And that's where you get their attention, right? Where like right now, we're at the beginning of most companies fiscal years and the kinds of conversations we're having with them are about their account planning process. How are they doing that? Is it already out of date if they've done it a week ago? how can we help automate that so that we can position their sellers to actually spend time selling rather than doing all this research? So It's really understanding and talking to customers and listening to our sellers on gong calls ⁓ they do ⁓ with customers of when the customer's eyes light up and they perk up and zeroing on things and using that in our positioning and messaging to differentiate. And Again, There's so much noise in AI that it really comes back fundamentally to talking about how you solve their challenges. And I think AI is obviously, it's primary for us in how we solve it, because you couldn't do it without it. But in their minds, that might be secondary. So It's more about how can we help you with the challenges that you have? And oh, by the way, we do it with AI, which also helps solve that board mandate or that CEO mandate. Jamie: Yeah. Greg Perotto: You don't always, in this world today, you don't always need to lead with AI. I think what you lead with is how you actually solve the customer's problems. Yeah. Jamie: I love it. I love that by the way. And I will tell you that's always one of the greatest challenges that I run into with companies that I work with are they talk about their product. They talk about their product and you just turned it around the same way that I do when I'm having these conversations, which is I don't care about you. Greg Perotto: Right. I'm happy to hear about your product once I know that you understand what problems I have and that you're here to solve those. Because that's the only reason why I'm going to take a call, right? And then to sort of back into the answer that I think you were sort of going out with events and that sort of thing. You know, we do the standard mix of outbound email, LinkedIn advertising, outbound. Jamie: Yes. Yes. Greg Perotto: cold messages on LinkedIn. And what I find ⁓ we capture some attention in those things. Email is a hard channel, I think, for anyone these days, but we capture attention. again, think ⁓ where shine is when, and where most marketers shine, is when you go to where the customer is. Whether that, like at New Relic, it was in ⁓ Reddit where they were talking about observability and monitoring. ⁓ And for us, ⁓ Jamie: Yeah. Love it. Greg Perotto: being with revenue leaders face to face, whether that's smaller intimate events or it's a massive event like Dreamforce, particularly following ⁓ the years of the pandemic where people weren't traveling and now they're far more excited to be back at ⁓ a than they to be on a virtual webinar or event sort of thing. Going where they are. ⁓ and being relevant to what is top of mind for them, I think is the key to breaking through the noise. Jamie: ⁓ no, no, I, I love it. And I agree completely go where they are is a great line. ⁓ I think it's fantastic. anything in particular that you've tried, in the last year that really just hasn't worked like anything that you're like, well, and again, I'm sure there's lots of individual tactics. I don't mean it like that, but something that you really thought was going to the didn't. ⁓ And when you look back at it, now you go. I kind of know why that didn't work out for me or work as well as it could have. Anything like that. Greg Perotto: Yeah, I don't think that there's, isn't necessarily something we've done that we've abandoned. I think there's something we've done that we're still trying to figure out. Jamie: Okay. Greg Perotto: And so talked a little bit about the ICP, who the core market is, right? And it generally is revenue leaders. So it could be a CRO, a chief sales officer, SVP, VP of sales, enterprise sales, that sort of thing. It's also revenue operations, right? Who are the partners to those leaders, helping them drive efficiency, optimize workflows, all that kind of stuff. Well, the reality is that if you look at a good percentage of our customers, you find that there's this linkage. between the different types of people that we really appeal to within an organization that isn't in their job description. It's not on their LinkedIn profile, although in some cases I should say it is. And it's these people who are ⁓ agents and catalysts and known inside the organization for ⁓ transformation and taking risks. And those people who are more often than not willing to, when they see something that clearly solves not just their needs on their job description, but the needs of their organization because of the kinds of people that think more broadly, wear, you know, they have their own sort of title hat that they wear, but then they also wear a hat for the company and they have like a broader perspective. It's those kinds of people that only really get it, but they become really strong champions inside an organization to to get us to all of the right people. And they're very vocal and they're also very trusted and respected internally. And the problem is you can't just go to LinkedIn as an example and find this person. Now don't get me wrong, there are some good tools. We use Poggio to help do that. But no one has a job description of that. Jamie: And fun. Greg Perotto: So it's not as straightforward as you would hope or expect, but those people really, really get it. Jamie: they moved the needle in the, there's always obviously a buying committee. So you talked about your main IPP and stuff. There's always a buying committee and the size of companies you're dealing with. And so it's good to find the person that sort of part of that group or extension on my group. That's going to help move the needle. That makes all the sense in the world. Greg Perotto: Yeah. And for us, that buying committee more and more has become an AI council, right? And it's made up of multiple people on the go-to-market revenue side, on the IT side, know, ⁓ security and compliance, different people within the organization who all have different interests in whatever AI technologies they bring into the business. Jamie: Yeah. All right, listen, ⁓ Greg, this was great. Like, I really, really appreciate it. the sake of everybody who's listening, watching, can tell people how to find you ⁓ and what you're doing? Greg Perotto: Absolutely. So LinkedIn is the best place for that. I think my ⁓ LinkedIn pretty easy to find, ⁓ but Greg Perato. ⁓ And think it's, you know, linkedin.com forward slash in forward slash Greg Perato. ⁓ So. Jamie: And we'll add, I'll add, by the way, sorry to interrupt you, but I'll add, we'll add links into the description. Greg Perotto: Perfect, yeah, follow me, connect with me. I love to learn from others and what they're doing and sort of extrapolate ⁓ that can help us in our business and certainly ⁓ hope that others are able to learn from me as well. Jamie: Well, thank you so much for your time. Really appreciate it. Guys, thank you for watching, and we'll see you in the next episode.