WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.680 My name is Walter Rivera, 2 00:00:01.680 --> 00:00:04.990 and I'm the head of sales and partnerships at Funderful. 3 00:00:04.990 --> 00:00:06.640 Basically our mission is to help universities, 4 00:00:06.640 --> 00:00:08.570 line:15% colleges and universities across the country, 5 00:00:08.570 --> 00:00:11.530 line:15% be able to update their, 6 00:00:11.530 --> 00:00:14.370 line:15% the way how they communicate with their alumni. 7 00:00:14.370 --> 00:00:17.420 line:15% Instead of providing a much better alumni engagement, 8 00:00:17.420 --> 00:00:20.010 line:15% I, instead of just doing the phone calls and emails 9 00:00:20.010 --> 00:00:21.560 and print the same way how schools have been doing it 10 00:00:21.560 --> 00:00:23.120 for the past couple of decades, 11 00:00:23.120 --> 00:00:25.890 being able to help schools communicate with their alumni 12 00:00:25.890 --> 00:00:28.830 through Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, texting, 13 00:00:28.830 --> 00:00:30.570 through messaging platforms, basically. 14 00:00:30.570 --> 00:00:35.570 line:15% So being a startup, I've had to wear so many different hats, 15 00:00:36.480 --> 00:00:41.170 line:15% from product to operations to customer success, 16 00:00:41.170 --> 00:00:42.780 so it's been a little bit of everything, 17 00:00:42.780 --> 00:00:44.920 and now we're finally starting to move into 18 00:00:44.920 --> 00:00:47.060 more of a structured sales 19 00:00:48.630 --> 00:00:50.190 department organization there. 20 00:00:50.190 --> 00:00:52.290 So, yeah, basically for me, 21 00:00:52.290 --> 00:00:54.290 it entails a lot of building relationships 22 00:00:54.290 --> 00:00:56.830 with a lot of potential clients, 23 00:00:56.830 --> 00:00:58.050 and just building relationships. 24 00:00:58.050 --> 00:01:00.350 It's a relatively small industry, 25 00:01:00.350 --> 00:01:03.300 so we need to be able to really be able to connect 26 00:01:03.300 --> 00:01:04.670 line:15% with potential clients, 27 00:01:04.670 --> 00:01:07.510 line:15% and just build a lot of relationships with them, 28 00:01:07.510 --> 00:01:09.530 line:15% so it involves a lot of going to trade shows 29 00:01:09.530 --> 00:01:12.600 line:15% and conferences and kinda really traveling a lot 30 00:01:12.600 --> 00:01:14.420 line:15% and meeting a lot of the different schools, 31 00:01:14.420 --> 00:01:17.860 understanding the clients, their needs and all that, 32 00:01:17.860 --> 00:01:22.240 and then after that, it also means 33 00:01:22.240 --> 00:01:24.783 a lot of cold emails, cold calls, 34 00:01:26.790 --> 00:01:30.410 follow-ups, and then negotiation with the contracts, 35 00:01:30.410 --> 00:01:31.243 and then finally 36 00:01:32.890 --> 00:01:35.100 having them sign the contract then. 37 00:01:35.100 --> 00:01:38.680 line:15% And then, coming from the first salesperson 38 00:01:38.680 --> 00:01:39.800 line:15% in that kind of startup, 39 00:01:39.800 --> 00:01:43.050 line:15% our role is basically not just go out there and sell, 40 00:01:43.050 --> 00:01:46.938 line:15% but then also be able to have to figure out 41 00:01:46.938 --> 00:01:49.110 what do people want, 42 00:01:49.110 --> 00:01:52.110 do a lot of that kind of customer discovery as you're going, 43 00:01:53.286 --> 00:01:55.970 and having to just set up essentially the whole 44 00:01:56.880 --> 00:01:58.690 kinda like sales model, 45 00:01:58.690 --> 00:02:01.140 understand what will be your traditional 46 00:02:01.140 --> 00:02:03.910 typical sales cycle and how to narrow it down, 47 00:02:03.910 --> 00:02:05.390 so we're in the higher education space. 48 00:02:05.390 --> 00:02:09.490 line:15% Sales cycles can go anywhere from three months to 18 months. 49 00:02:09.490 --> 00:02:11.330 line:15% So being able to kinda try to keep between that, 50 00:02:11.330 --> 00:02:13.600 line:15% how do we keep it like under six months sales cycle. 51 00:02:13.600 --> 00:02:15.960 line:15% So it's a lot of kind of that type of work 52 00:02:15.960 --> 00:02:18.570 line:15% that now that we figured all that out, 53 00:02:18.570 --> 00:02:19.970 then now it's where now we're expanding 54 00:02:19.970 --> 00:02:21.533 the hiring a full sales team.