"Sell the alpha, not the feature": The enterprise sales playbook for $1M to $10M ARR | Jen Abel
Jen Abel is GM of Enterprise at State Affairs and co-founded Jellyfish, a consultancy that helps founders learn zero-to-one enterprise sales. She’s one of the smartest people I’ve ever met on learning enterprise sales, and in this follow-up to our first chat two years ago (covering the zero to $1 million ARR founder-led sales phase), we focus on the skills founders need to learn to go from $1M to $10M ARR. We discuss:
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Where to find Jen Abel:• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/earlystagesales • Website: https://www.jjellyfish.com Referenced:• The ultimate guide to founder-led sales | Jen Abel (co-founder of JJELLYFISH): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/master-founder-led-sales-jen-abel • Mario meme: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/missing-meme-led-me-woman-johann-van-tonder-im6df • Kathy Sierra: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Sierra • Cursor: https://cursor.com • The rise of Cursor: The $300M ARR AI tool that engineers can’t stop using | Michael Truell (co-founder and CEO): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-rise-of-cursor-michael-truell • Justin Lawson on X: https://x.com/jjustin_lawson • Stripe: https://stripe.com • Building product at Stripe: craft, metrics, and customer obsession | Jeff Weinstein (Product lead): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/building-product-at-stripe-jeff-weinstein • He saved OpenAI, invented the “Like” button, and built Google Maps: Bret Taylor on the future of careers, coding, agents, and more: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/he-saved-openai-bret-taylor • OpenAI’s CPO on how AI changes must-have skills, moats, coding, startup playbooks, more | Kevin Weil (CPO at OpenAI, ex-Instagram, Twitter): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/kevin-weil-open-ai • Anthropic’s CPO on what comes next | Mike Krieger (co-founder of Instagram): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/anthropics-cpo-heres-what-comes-next • Linear: https://linear.app • Linear’s secret to building beloved B2B products | Nan Yu (Head of Product): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/linears-secret-to-building-beloved-b2b-products-nan-yu • Gemini: https://gemini.google.com • Microsoft Copilot: https://copilot.microsoft.com • How Palantir built the ultimate founder factory | Nabeel S. Qureshi (founder, writer, ex-Palantir): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/inside-palantir-nabeel-qureshi • McKinsey & Company: https://www.mckinsey.com • Deloitte: https://www.deloitte.com • Accenture: https://www.accenture.com • Building a world-class sales org | Jason Lemkin (SaaStr): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/building-a-world-class-sales-org • Peter Dedene on X: https://x.com/peterdedene • Hang Huang on X: https://x.com/HH_HangHuang • Hugo Alves on X: https://x.com/Ugo_alves • A step-by-step guide to crafting a sales pitch that wins | April Dunford (author of Obviously Awesome and Sales Pitch): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/a-step-by-step-guide-to-crafting • Clay: https://www.clay.com • Apollo: https://www.apollo.io • Jason Lemkin on X: https://x.com/jasonlk • Gavin Baker on X: https://x.com/GavinSBaker • Jason Cohen on X: https://x.com/asmartbear • Baywatch on Prime Video: https://www.primevideo.com/detail/Baywatch/0NU9YS8WWRNQO1NZD5DOQ3I8W6 • Playground: https://www.tryplayground.com • ClassDojo: https://www.classdojo.com • Jason Lemkin’s post about Replit: https://x.com/jasonlk/status/1946069562723897802 Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com. Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed. My biggest takeaways from this conversation:...Subscribe to Lenny's Newsletter to unlock the rest.Become a paying subscriber of Lenny's Newsletter to get access to this post and other subscriber-only content. A subscription gets you:
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