Tech Sales is for Hustlers Podcast

Episode 49: Sadie Kneuper – Listen, Understand, Engage

Sadie Kneuper will tell you the difference between chatting and listening is simple – people chat, sales pros listen. And, as she explains to her team of SDRs during training, it’s the single best way to get to know your customer and help solve their problems.

Sadie, now an Enterprise Account Executive at CB Insights, parlayed those listening skills along with hard work and curiosity to hit her own professional goals. And it’s paying off in a big way. A relentless student of the game and Semi-Finalist in the memoryBlue 2021 Alumni of the Year competition, Sadie manages her own high-performance SDR team these days.

In this episode of Tech Sales is for Hustlers, Sadie relays how honest conversations can yield valuable information, why she takes time to learn from her SDRs even as she teaches them the ropes, and how she makes being a “wild pro” work in a non-traditional way.

Guest-At-A-Glance

Name: Sadie Kneuper

What she does: Sadie is Enterprise Account Executive at CB Insights.

Company: CB Insights

Noteworthy: Sadie is a part of CB Insights, a tech market intelligence platform that analyzes millions of data points on venture capital, startups, patents, partnerships, and news mentions to help clients see tomorrow’s opportunities, today.

Where to find Sadie: LinkedIn

Key Insights

⚡Listening to people and trying to understand will take you places. According to Sadie, sales is not just about chatting on product specifics; it is more about the personal relationship with a potential buyer. She thinks listening to people can improve your chances for a sale because an honest conversation can provide you with valuable information. “You learn so much more from listening. So many salespeople are just chatting. They don’t take a step back. I think this is where being a people person comes in. I don’t think a lot of people are good with people like they think they are. It’s very emotional intelligence-related.”

⚡ Find a healthy motivation. Selling a product won’t be successful if a salesperson is not entirely into it and ready to focus and dedicate. That’s the reason why salespeople need to be prepared to give their 100%. “I interview potential AEs quite often for CB Insights. It’s so hard because they ask you that question, ‘Are you going to work your ass off? I don’t know if you are.’ I’m hard on myself, not in a bad way, in a motivational way, but probably too much. I will work my ass off. I will if I’m into something. You have to have that. You also have to be self-sufficient or want to learn some things on your own.” 

⚡ Salespeople leave for different reasons. While changing a company and a product you’re selling might be a good move, stop and think about why you want to make a change. Think about you, about your motivation and priorities. “I think they start getting almost cocky. It’s on everyone else except them. They have a bad quarter, and they’re like, ‘Well, this company goes nowhere.’ I think jumping too early, probably thinking something else is prettier, and I’m not saying it’s not. I think we jump a lot for a product and things like that, maybe growth. There are good and bad jumps. I have found that I’m passionate about the product, and that will be important for me. I never knew that would be the number one. Products became big to me. I think sometimes people jump because of that too.”

Episode Highlights

Start with caution, listen, and engage afterward

“I’m going to go back to the first day. I was very quiet; this is how I always am. I was observing, figuring things out, cold calls, all of that. Listening to people, figuring out who I would work with as clients. Then I got more comfortable for sure. I learned a lot from listening to people’s calls, talking about their processes. I was friends with a lot of people too, so people would complain, people would talk about an awesome call when we were outside or something.”

Demos can improve your game if you look at them the right way

“I watched so many demos where my AEs were demoing as an SDR. Then you translate that into your demo. It’s so funny. You don’t know where to go. You’re constantly trying to make some order like every call is going to go the same. 

Now I do a lot of training with new AEs. I need to hit the quota, guys. I’m doing too many pieces of training, but I give it hence feedback, a long list of feedback. I love it so much. They are so good. They’re better than when I started, in terms of getting the product fast. I was, ‘You know everything, but hold that in. Remember that you’re having a conversation.’ I don’t know if it helps you to go on camera, but take a step back and just figure out what they want.” 

About CB Insights platform

“It used to be Chubby Brain. That’s what the CB stood for. They had to change that. It’s a web-based platform. I know that sounds specific. Teams, innovation strategy ventures, will use us in different ways, but very much like a private market and innovation-focused. With that, we’ll be tracking private company data, huge things like partnerships, investments, all of that valuation, if we can source it. We track that in a holistic way within the platform. A systematic approach to that is awesome. It’s what they do before they enter a new market. We’re trying to give people insights into what strategy they need to make. Our analyst team does research to combine with that data piece that you can use in the platform.” 

Working with SDRs is an exciting mission

“They teach me things too, which is important. I know they’re going to be nervous in the beginning, but I push them a little bit. I get on the calls with them a lot in the beginning. I’m there for them, but I want to push them a little bit. I’ll even tell them what to say throughout. It helps them learn how to talk to people in these roles. 

One of the most important things for CB insights is that you have to know the high level at least what a venture team would want, ideally versus innovation. Then you learn everything else. You have your stuff in your head, you ask if that’s correct, and then you get some feedback. You go from there. The organization is very important. Teach them about the organization. We don’t let anything slip through the cracks. Tighten it up, tighten everything up.”

Transcript:

[00:00:00] Chris Corcoran: [00:00:00] Three. 

[00:00:07] Three. 

[00:00:13] Three, two, one. 

[00:00:20] Sadie Kneuper, coming at us live and direct from NYC, the Greenpoint neighborhood in the borough of Brooklyn. Let’s do it. 

[00:01:01] [00:01:00] Can’t hear you, Marc. We can’t 

[00:01:02] hear you.  

[00:01:06] Sadie Kneuper: [00:01:06] He looks… 

[00:01:08] Chris Corcoran: [00:01:08] We can’t hear you. I don’t know. 

[00:01:16] Sadie Kneuper: [00:01:16] Technical difficulties. No.

[00:01:23] Chris Corcoran: [00:01:23] We’re gonna start 

[00:01:23] this one over. 

[00:01:25] Sadie Kneuper: [00:01:25] Oh, how you can do the same 

[00:01:26] pitch? 

[00:01:27] Chris Corcoran: [00:01:27] I can do it. 

[00:01:32] We can’t hear you, M.G. 

[00:01:38] It was. He’s logged back in. Sadie, do you have roommates? 

[00:01:54] Sadie Kneuper: [00:01:54] No, I live 

[00:01:55] alone.

[00:01:56] Chris Corcoran: [00:01:56] Are you serious? What’s rent? 

[00:02:00] [00:02:00] Sadie Kneuper: [00:02:00] Here it’s 2,600. I have like a 1.5. Yeah. yeah. It’s all I’m in touch, but… 

[00:02:06] Chris Corcoran: [00:02:06] 2,600. Oh, and so how many square feet? 

[00:02:10] Sadie Kneuper: [00:02:10] I think it’s said 7.50. It’s pretty big though, honestly. It’s pretty big for New York. Like everyone who walks in here. Like I got it during the pandemic. Like you used to live in for like 18 hundreds. So graded a little bit on the size. 

[00:02:23] Chris Corcoran: [00:02:23] Okay. 

[00:02:24] Sadie Kneuper: [00:02:24] Yeah. But yeah. I live alone. 

[00:02:26] Chris Corcoran: [00:02:26] That’s awesome. 

[00:02:28] Sadie Kneuper: [00:02:28] Yeah, it’s a little fun during this time, but.

[00:02:33] Chris Corcoran: [00:02:33] Hey, rapscallion. We got to start it all over again. 

[00:02:39] So, Cara Caroline. 

[00:02:43] She’s out, walking her dog or something. Yeah, let’s just count it down. Ready? 

[00:02:50] 3, 2, 1. Sadie Kneuper, coming at us live and [00:03:00] direct from New York City and a Greenpoint neighborhood in the borough of Brooklyn. Sadie, 

[00:03:05] welcome.

[00:03:06] Sadie Kneuper: [00:03:06] Thank you. It’s great to be here.

[00:03:08] Marc Gonyea: [00:03:08] Sadie, it’s been a 

[00:03:09] long time. Let me introduce you properly to the audience here.

[00:03:15] So first of all, when you were, at 

[00:03:16] your memoryBlue days, you were straight 

[00:03:18] up baller. Second, a recent alum of the year, semifinalist, which is we’ll we’ll, we’ll get into that. You’re now living in Brooklyn, as Chris so eloquently stated, most importantly for some your PVI alum. 

[00:03:36] And, and we’ll talk about this. you won. 

[00:03:38] What? You were Virginia state champion free-throws in fifth grade? 

[00:03:42] Sadie Kneuper: [00:03:42] that are interesting. And that’s why I peaked. So, had to put that one. 

[00:03:47] Marc Gonyea: [00:03:47] All right. We’ll 

[00:03:48] get into it. Well, 

[00:03:49] welcome. Chris and I are thrilled to have you. 

[00:03:52] Sadie Kneuper: [00:03:52] Yeah. I’m glad to be here. It’s good to see you guys again, it only took the alumni 

[00:03:55] thing to connect again.

[00:03:59] Marc Gonyea: [00:03:59] Well, you know what? [00:04:00] Better late 

[00:04:00] than never. Let’s do this. So 

[00:04:06] the people listening, 

[00:04:07] right? People who work here now, people who think about coming 

[00:04:10] to work 

[00:04:10] at memoryBlue and some 

[00:04:11] of your colleagues from your golden days, you 

[00:04:13] know, memoryBlue time and 

[00:04:15] others. Share with us a little bit about yourself. You know, kind of where you grew up, that sort of thing.

[00:04:21] Walk us through kind of that high school, college briefly and then we’ll kind of get into it. 

[00:04:25] Sadie Kneuper: [00:04:25] Cool. So I grew up in Northern Virginia. so been here or been there all my life bounced around. So when people ask me like where I’m from, I don’t know what to say. I’ve lived everywhere from like Centerville to Fairfax, Leesburg to Falls Church. And I don’t have military, I’m not a military brat, so I don’t know.

[00:04:45] I don’t know what happened. 

[00:04:46] but yeah. So grew up in Northern Virginia. I was here up into high school. You mentioned PVI, went to high school at PVI, at Radford University. 

[00:04:56] Marc Gonyea: [00:04:56] Yep. 

[00:04:57] Sadie Kneuper: [00:04:57] Southern Virginia [00:05:00] Highlanders. Yeah, I it’s the mascot is plaid, it’s wearing plaid. It’s cool, I guess. so yeah, I did that and 

[00:05:07] then I moved to New York after memoryBlue, of course.

[00:05:12] But I think I was 24, maybe. Try to think how long I’ve been here. Yeah.

[00:05:16] Marc Gonyea: [00:05:16] Well, let’s get into that. So when you were in college, what’d you 

[00:05:18] major in?

[00:05:20] Sadie Kneuper: [00:05:20] I majored in marketing and beer. No, just marketing.

[00:05:23] Marc Gonyea: [00:05:23] You know.

[00:05:25] Chris Corcoran: [00:05:25] Okay. 

[00:05:27] Marc Gonyea: [00:05:27] So marketing, what did you think 

[00:05:29] you’re gonna do when you were, 

[00:05:32] when you were when you were a senior at Radford? You know, what did you think you’re 

[00:05:35] gonna do when you got out of school? 

[00:05:37] Sadie Kneuper: [00:05:37] Yeah, in a perfect world, I would be, you know, some sort of in music or TV behind the camera, maybe. but it, with regards to marketing, kind of what I was thinking of, I really liked market research. I loved like the consumer, like mind behind why we, why you buy something, why you like something, how you develop like strong brand [00:06:00] recognition and retain people.

[00:06:01] So if you think of like Jeep or something Costco. So 

[00:06:05] like different successes like that, I loved 

[00:06:07] those classes. Now, if I could be in ‘Mad 

[00:06:10] Men’, like those times is the advertising I liked, but I’m not that into the advertising currently anymore. It’s just, I don’t think I can be as passionate about it. So I was kind of transferred into like the sales thought process.

[00:06:23] I could always see myself in sales. 

[00:06:25] I don’t know if you can major in that. Not at marketing. I mean, not at Radford, so, But yeah, I think that’s kind of how I transitioned sort of into.. 

[00:06:32] Marc Gonyea: [00:06:32] What did you see? Did you, were there’s anything about Sadie in like high school PVI or college or early that maybe the sales thing might be, something you might be 

[00:06:40] good at? 

[00:06:42] Sadie Kneuper: [00:06:42] I could throw a good party, I think. That’s, that’s organization, planning and persistence. now the other thing is, so I 

[00:06:52] have three brothers and not that all boys like sports. I mean, I probably 

[00:06:57] know more about certain things than they do, [00:07:00] at least two out of three of them. 

[00:07:01] Marc Gonyea: [00:07:01] You played You played sports at PVI, right? Yep. 

[00:07:03] We talked about it. What did you play?

[00:07:05] Sadie Kneuper: [00:07:05] Yeah, so I played basketball and I played soccer like all throughout my life, but I didn’t play in high school. I play any sport for fun. My, my brothers and I were playing lacrosse like outside. He, Nick would pick me for football before the other two boys, my oldest brother. I can throw a football, I mean the ball.

[00:07:22] So I think sports in general, that 

[00:07:24] when you have that competitive mentality, you also are working on a team. So you’re, you’re learning that how to work with people. That definitely led me to probably some of like the way I am, like in sales day to day. Just 

[00:07:36] being with people, like just talking to 

[00:07:38] people. I don’t know. So yeah, I think sport’s definitely big kind of ticker 

[00:07:42] for me getting into sales. 

[00:07:44] Marc Gonyea: [00:07:44] Is there anything else? Or just..? That that’s good, 

[00:07:47] but

[00:07:49] Sadie Kneuper: [00:07:49] Is there anything else? Okay. So I’m a charmer, maybe. I didn’t know 

[00:07:52] this, but you know, now I’ve kind of, I kind of just act like myself during sales. It’s actually pretty not therapeutic, but it’s pretty relieving in a way. [00:08:00] I think a lot of people think like sales is like fakie and pushy. I can be pushy like sometimes on a deal, but it’s, it’s very 

[00:08:08] realistically me during that time.

[00:08:11] So I don’t know. It’s kind of relieving what to act like myself daily. 

[00:08:15] Marc Gonyea: [00:08:15] We’ll get into 

[00:08:16] that. I want to get that. All right. So you, so you got out of 

[00:08:18] Radford marketing major. What happened then? Like how did you end up 

[00:08:22] at memoryBlue? Was this 

[00:08:24] anything in between or..? 

[00:08:26] Sadie Kneuper: [00:08:26] Yeah, that’s a good question. There is something in between. Aflac, pretty wild. So they’re commissioned only. I was really just kind of interviewed at a lot of jobs. I didn’t 

[00:08:36] want to take them. There was a lot of outside sales, selling printers and things like that. Not that that’s bad, but I was really not trying to go there.

[00:08:44] So I did Aflac, but you know, truly, it was just kind of, I was trying to find something else, better college. I found you guys. Trying to remember ’cause it was through reading initially. So I think it was through reading and finding you on LinkedIn. Thought the company [00:09:00] like the pitch was so cool. Like the idea of like 

[00:09:03] then your client could potentially hire you out.

[00:09:05] I don’t know. It’s so 

[00:09:06] interesting. And I found Robbie Connors works there. 

[00:09:10] No, I was like, “What?”

[00:09:11] Marc Gonyea: [00:09:11] And that’ll buy us, right? Wow, 

[00:09:13] PVI, posse. Okay. All right. 

[00:09:15] Sadie Kneuper: [00:09:15] I’d reached out to Robbie for 

[00:09:16] sure. I think Lauren probably too, “So do you like this place? What’s up with it? Like, 

[00:09:21] you know, give me the lowdown.” Robbie of course, yeah, total lover of memoryBlue, just killing it from me. Like just, you know, everything nice to say. I’m 

[00:09:30] like, “Tell me some dirt, 

[00:09:31] man.” But no, he’s great.

[00:09:34] Like, and he probably, did he get the referral money? I hope I hooked him up with that.

[00:09:39] Marc Gonyea: [00:09:39] He might have, but it’s all right. This is December of 2014. So it 

[00:09:43] was a while ago.

[00:09:45] Sadie Kneuper: [00:09:45] It’s true. And I remember I was, I was, I had my notes out for the interview before I went in, I was at Panera, you know, eating my broccoli cheddar soup, having a great time, but I was, 

[00:09:55] “Geez, I gotta get this down. I really want to work at memoryBlue.” So [00:10:00] yeah, that’s the story there.

[00:10:02] Marc Gonyea: [00:10:02] All right. And you came in and then what do you remember 

[00:10:05] from the early days? So you started right around the new year. 

[00:10:08] It looks like. 

[00:10:10] Sadie Kneuper: [00:10:10] You don’t remember this by heart? 

[00:10:11] Marc Gonyea: [00:10:11] I don’t. 

[00:10:12] I’m so sorry. That’s why I don’t get invited into your parties that you throw. 

[00:10:15] ‘Cause I don’t

[00:10:16] remember. 

[00:10:18] Sadie Kneuper: [00:10:18] Back in the day, maybe. Not anymore. 

[00:10:20]Marc Gonyea: [00:10:20] Not anymore. 

[00:10:22] Sadie Kneuper: [00:10:22] But yeah. So the early days, that is an interesting question. So I was next to Robbie, I think. Actually I was. Okay. We’ll go back to like the first day I was very quiet. This is how I always am. I sort of observe, but I think I’m like brutally quiet where it’s like very confusing because now you know me and you’re like, ‘What?” Like 30 days in.

[00:10:43] But I was, I know Joey Cohen. He was like… It was a couple of other people, Lauren Montross. She was near me. So I was 

[00:10:50] observing, trying to figure it out. I wasn’t at the boon office at the time. I was at the regular. 

[00:10:55] Marc Gonyea: [00:10:55] Okay. 

[00:10:56] Sadie Kneuper: [00:10:56] I like boon way better. 

[00:10:57] Marc Gonyea: [00:10:57] I know. We’ll 

[00:10:58] talk about that.

[00:11:00] [00:10:59] Sadie Kneuper: [00:10:59] Well, yeah. So I was just observing, kind of figuring things out cold calls, all that, like listening into people, 

[00:11:05] figuring out like who I would work with as clients, just kind of to the first onboarding things typical.

[00:11:10] But then, you know, I got, I got more comfortable for sure. I 

[00:11:13] had Lee Lee as a delivery 

[00:11:15] manager.

[00:11:16] Chris Corcoran: [00:11:16] Lee Ryan.

[00:11:17] Sadie Kneuper: [00:11:17] Yeah. So that was cool, but yeah, just learning a lot and being quiet and weirdo, for the first few days. 

[00:11:24] Marc Gonyea: [00:11:24] What’d you remember? Like, so when you got on the phone, ’cause I definitely remember 

[00:11:27] you being yourself, but your, I remember you being a hard worker and you, you were there the 15 months, right before you moved up to New York and got converted. W w what what, what was it like getting on the phones? Like, did you kind of know 

[00:11:39] what you’re going to be doing? 

[00:11:41] Sadie Kneuper: [00:11:41] Yeah. That’s a great question because first of all, I was there 15 months just ’cause, you know, I wanted to be. 

[00:11:47] Yeah. 

[00:11:49] All right. So, Oracle. 

[00:11:51] Anyway. So on the phones, this 

[00:11:53] is a great question because this is something that I really nailed down and used on every call. You guys are gonna have to remind me what it’s [00:12:00] called, but it’s when you say something like now, typically when we talk to XYZ, they do ‘one, two, three’ or they came about ‘one, two, three.’

[00:12:07] What did you guys call 

[00:12:07] that?

[00:12:13] Marc Gonyea: [00:12:13] It’s like typically when I talk to people in your position, the conversation centers around this, that or this. Let me give you a choice, right? Yes. 

[00:12:23] Sadie Kneuper: [00:12:23] So that really worked for me. I don’t know what it was. 

[00:12:26] Yeah. So I did it on almost every call. So I would walk away because I like to struck, but I also like don’t really care for people like stalking me on the phone. So I struck down the hall of Boone, 

[00:12:36] I come back in and I got a 

[00:12:38] meeting. Robbie’s like, “What, what did they, what did you just do?”

[00:12:41] Ann Bores, like. So I did a lot of that on my calls and yeah, you know, it didn’t come right away. And I honestly probably made some fake dials. I’m sorry guys, but so we’ll just call it professional. Verizon headquarters to get your numbers [00:13:00] 15. Yeah. For 15 months. But the reason I could get quarters, usually off of like, emails and calls. You call your VIP’s.

[00:13:08] And you do some emails, which was tough. You guys I was tracking everything on an 

[00:13:11] Excel sheet, emailed for 4.40, emailed for 4.16 it was crazy. Like, I dunno, that was wild. 

[00:13:20] Marc Gonyea: [00:13:20] You were part of the 

[00:13:21] early days when we made or really do 

[00:13:22] a manual, 

[00:13:23] because this is before these cadence systems existed. And we felt sincerely that like you learn better that way how to do it. 

[00:13:32] So you, we wouldn’t train you 

[00:13:33] to be an indoor cat, which when you’d be in an outdoor cat, right? The outbound outbound 

[00:13:37] person.

[00:13:39] Sadie Kneuper: [00:13:39] Yeah. You guys did it. You guys probably did contribute. I mean, you definitely contributed to how, 

[00:13:44] like my, my organization isn’t something that anyone else wants to look at, but it works for me. So I haven’t, I have a second calendar that’s hidden somewhere SDRs obviously wouldn’t be able to book anything

[00:13:55] if they saw my CD number two. 

[00:13:58] Pretty much it looks like my Excel sheets, [00:14:00] like everything, my to do list insane. So yeah, that 

[00:14:03] comes from you guys, I think. 

[00:14:05] Marc Gonyea: [00:14:05] So would you say, as you were kind of learning the game, did you learn it from, like you learn that from someone that you learned from your colleagues, did you learn from like call reviews or like, what was your learning process like? If 

[00:14:15] you can remember, take us back to that. 

[00:14:17] Sadie Kneuper: [00:14:17] Yeah. And I remember those trainings that we did. Those are awesome. Like once a week we get in the car and whip it. Like somebody was like, “All right, everyone get in my car.” That was awesome. I learned from those a lot. There’s a lot of senior people that would talk during 

[00:14:30] that time. 

[00:14:30] But I remember West for sure.

[00:14:33] And like, 

[00:14:35] yeah, I can’t remember some other seniors. I’ve got all their 

[00:14:38] faces, but you know, 

[00:14:39] Marc Gonyea: [00:14:39] They would get in the car. They’d go to training at, at a Tech

[00:14:41] Corner? 

[00:14:42] Chris Corcoran: [00:14:42] Yeah. 

[00:14:43] Marc Gonyea: [00:14:43] All right. I

[00:14:43] forgot.

[00:14:44] Sadie Kneuper: [00:14:44] Yeah, hot chocolate. 

[00:14:45] Marc Gonyea: [00:14:45] I forgot about that. Oh, that’s right. That’s right. They had like the nice condiments in their little hot 

[00:14:49] chocolate area, whatever their little 

[00:14:51] Sadie Kneuper: [00:14:51] Yeah. I’m sure you guys have like machines now and stuff. Gosh, 

[00:14:55] Marc Gonyea: [00:14:55] You got to 

[00:14:55] come back, I say to you. Hey, open invitation. We can get to 16 months. [00:15:00] We 

[00:15:00] can get there.

[00:15:00] Sadie Kneuper: [00:15:00] I gotta come back. I gotta come back definitely visit you guys, but yeah. So that was good like those trainings. I learned a lot 

[00:15:07] from, yeah, just listening to people’s calls, talking about their processes. Like I was friends with a 

[00:15:12] lot of people too, so, you know, people would complain and people would talk about like an awesome call when we were outside or something.

[00:15:18] So you learn a lot just from that too, I think. So I can think of like Yaseen. Like, yeah, he would just like kill it. I mean, he looked kind of like angry. His eyebrows are like furrowed while he’s walking around, but you also like would be loud as hell because he wants everyone to hear and that’s Yaseen, but you still learning from the kid.

[00:15:38] So him you know, I was next to Robbie and he would constantly be asking about like LinkedIn strategies. We were talking about everything. So yeah. You learn from your peers. We didn’t have a ton of tools at 

[00:15:49] the time, again, like we talked about. So

[00:15:51] I think in a way that was good. You got to talk to people even more and learn some stuff.

[00:15:55] So 

[00:15:56] Marc Gonyea: [00:15:56] Yep. Absolutely. What do you… I’m sorry, I’m running away with the sync. Corcoran. Feel 

[00:16:00] [00:15:59] free to talk with me over. 

[00:16:02] Chris Corcoran: [00:16:02] No, no, no, no, no. Well, so Sadie, when when did you migrate, the great migration from Old Courthouse Road to Boone 

[00:16:09] Boulevard? 

[00:16:10] Sadie Kneuper: [00:16:10] I’m trying to think about that because that was like a glory moment, went into Boon. It felt like, yeah. And I knew some people at Boone. I think. So, I think Rob or Robbie was over there for sure. It was a good move for 

[00:16:24] me. I can’t remember. Feel like he was just a couple months in and then I was 

[00:16:28] over there.

[00:16:29] Chris Corcoran: [00:16:29] Sadie, describe for our listeners, the Boon experience. 

[00:16:34] Sadie Kneuper: [00:16:34] The Boon experience. When did we get the K grader? I’m 

[00:16:36] trying to think about that. Mike Mishler, works hard and plays hard. 

[00:16:40] That’s for sure. 

[00:16:41] the Boon experience, it was a 

[00:16:42] little like hot in there. 

[00:16:45] Marc Gonyea: [00:16:45] It was hot as hell. 

[00:16:47] Sadie Kneuper: [00:16:47] So that was good. Yeah, it was just an experience, but we had a good 

[00:16:50] setup.

[00:16:51] It would like go around kinda like, so you could like walk around with your calls and I don’t know, I like that setup. You got side great [00:17:00] cheese steak at the Deli. Love that. But the Boon experience is great. There was a lot of people to learn from that boon, like that had way different styles. So I think the group in there was just, it was just a good setup,

[00:17:10] for me personally to learn 

[00:17:12] from. 

[00:17:14] Chris Corcoran: [00:17:14] Heating up cold 

[00:17:15] calls in Boone. 

[00:17:17] Sadie Kneuper: [00:17:17] Heating up cold calls. I mean, literally it was hot. Yeah. 

[00:17:20] Marc Gonyea: [00:17:20] Sadie, besides yourself, 

[00:17:22] besides yourself, who is the, who is the, besides yourself, who’s 

[00:17:24] the best SDR you worked 

[00:17:25] with? I mean, you drop some, some, some 

[00:17:27] talent there. 

[00:17:30] Sadie Kneuper: [00:17:30] Besides myself? I was not who’s the best SDR at the time I was there? Okay. So I remember some names that were constantly hitting from the other side, Scott something.

[00:17:39] Marc Gonyea: [00:17:39] I don’t remember. 

[00:17:41] Sorry, go on. 

[00:17:42] Sadie Kneuper: [00:17:42] Marc Logic, inbound though.

[00:17:47] Marc Gonyea: [00:17:47] I love it.

[00:17:48] Sadie Kneuper: [00:17:48] You can cut that. 

[00:17:49] Marc Gonyea: [00:17:49] Wait, wait, wait, what do you mean? What 

[00:17:51] do you mean by inbound? What do you mean? 

[00:17:53] Sadie Kneuper: [00:17:53] Oh, come on, Marc. We’ve talked about 

[00:17:55] this. You’re smiling. Inbound. I don’t know the logistics of it. I just remember people [00:18:00] kind of talking about it. You know, but I was like, “Oh, okay.”

[00:18:03] Marc Gonyea: [00:18:03] You are, you’re 

[00:18:04] truthfully on outbound accounts? Like 

[00:18:07] hardcore outbound, 

[00:18:08] right? 

[00:18:09] Sadie Kneuper: [00:18:09] Oracle, Mark, 

[00:18:12] Sam software.

[00:18:14] Marc Gonyea: [00:18:14] Yeah, yeah. You 

[00:18:15] are, you are a hardcore. 

[00:18:16] And then yeah, 

[00:18:18] I remember it now. That’s right. We were talking about inbound versus outbound. There’s a rivalry 

[00:18:21] at memoryBlue. Marc Logic, who 

[00:18:22] was a Marc Logic?

[00:18:24] Sadie Kneuper: [00:18:24] Okay. So at the 

[00:18:25] time it was a God,.. 

[00:18:27] Marc Gonyea: [00:18:27] Frank Taylor? 

[00:18:28] Sadie Kneuper: [00:18:28] So Frank Taylor, I would definitely remember. 

[00:18:30] Marc Gonyea: [00:18:30] F T3. 

[00:18:33] Sadie Kneuper: [00:18:33] And with brown hair. 

[00:18:34] Marc Gonyea: [00:18:34] Does, does 

[00:18:35] it matter? 

[00:18:37] Sadie Kneuper: [00:18:37] It does matter. I think he went to work there after, so I’m trying to think about who that was, 

[00:18:41] Marc Gonyea: [00:18:41] oh, 

[00:18:42] Sadie Kneuper: [00:18:42] but… 

[00:18:42] Marc Gonyea: [00:18:42] Conor with the work there. Mike, Mike Caney with the work there. I think they were

[00:18:45] after your time, 

[00:18:46] that some of these guys. Because we, we kind of rolled through a couple of different crews because people got new jobs. All right. You were in Boone, doing your thing. And then so as you were at memoryBlue working, what did you think you were going to do? [00:19:00] Like, I knew you’re working 

[00:19:00] for Fish Daddy, and you’re doing well on your campaign, at memoryBlue you always hit your quota. What you know, you became a senior SDR, which is that, that, that you have to earn that. Right? Right got a bump in your base. Did your bid all the things you have to do to do those things?

[00:19:14] What’d you think you’re going to do next? Like did you kind 

[00:19:16] of settle to hit the sales 

[00:19:17] thing? That’s kind of 

[00:19:18] cool, I’m doubt that even 

[00:19:19] dreaming about advertising and 

[00:19:20] marketing research or what? 

[00:19:22] Sadie Kneuper: [00:19:22] No, I liked sales. So I started like, I started liking sales for sure. Now it’s interesting because it’s not like I necessarily loved what I was selling. I liked the vibe of sales though. So, I mean, this is getting forward and, and, 

[00:19:37] and I 

[00:19:37] won’t address this holistically yet, but CB Insights, like that’s a product I love.

[00:19:43] So now I’ve found the happy… 

[00:19:46] Marc Gonyea: [00:19:46] Yeah, well, we’ll get to that. I mean, 

[00:19:47] Chris is 

[00:19:47] going to break for sure. 

[00:19:49] Sadie Kneuper: [00:19:49] Yeah, but reversing back. So I did, I did like sales. I learned that for sure.  think I probably always knew that, working with people. But yeah, what I wanted to do, 

[00:20:00] [00:20:00] I mean, I was thinking, I was looking at other companies too ’cause I was getting to that 15 months. So I was able to do that. But then NetX ultimately wanted to hire me. Now,

[00:20:09] I had the background of like the Oracle and things like that. So I thought I truly like, was going to maybe want to pursue like the IT type sales. Not for me, it turns out. But yeah, I 

[00:20:19] definitely was into sales. That’s for sure. Now, ideally I 

[00:20:22] wanted to be in New

[00:20:23] York. Didn’t know what kind of product I want to sell yet.

[00:20:25] Nothing like that. 

[00:20:26] Marc Gonyea: [00:20:26] But remember these guys were so, were they were a client 

[00:20:28] or do they come back and want to hire 

[00:20:29] somebody who is leaving?

[00:20:31] Sadie Kneuper: [00:20:31] So they basically were like, 

[00:20:33] a partner for Oracle. So they third-party sell. yeah, but I don’t know how they came in. Like did

[00:20:39] Marc Gonyea: [00:20:39] When they came 

[00:20:39] in, I think you worked on it and then you work down. They said, “Hey, we want to hire you.” We were like, “Do it.” because I know you want to get to New York. You and I talked about it 

[00:20:46] and you’ve worked out 

[00:20:46] in 

[00:20:46] Northern Virginia 

[00:20:47] for a little while. Right? And then kind of 

[00:20:48] felt it out that you moved 

[00:20:49] up 

[00:20:49] to where they were.

[00:20:50] Sadie Kneuper: [00:20:50] Six months. 

[00:20:51] Marc Gonyea: [00:20:51] Yeah, 6 million 

[00:20:52] Hoboken and where were they?

[00:20:54] Sadie Kneuper: [00:20:54] They were in Bay Ridge, Bay Ridge Brooklyn. So if you think about where I’m at Greenpoint up here Bay Ridge is [00:21:00] like literally a year approaching, like getting close to Staten Island right across the bridge. 

[00:21:03] Everyone was like, “You’ve worked in Bay Ridge?” Like, “There’s an office there”? Like very, very confusing.

[00:21:10] But yeah, so it got me to New York.

[00:21:11] Marc Gonyea: [00:21:11] But it got you to New York. And then like, 

[00:21:13] I know you learned some stuff there. You’re there for a little while. Then 

[00:21:15] you, then, then you 

[00:21:16] like what’d you learn there and what inspired you to go? ‘Cause there were like a hardcore bar 

[00:21:20] for like storage stuff. Right? 

[00:21:22] Sadie Kneuper: [00:21:22] Yes. So I learned a lot and I loved the guys and loved the team. It gave me a lot of experience in terms of like, person to person, like it was outside sales, essentially. Like I was doing a lot of calling. I was trying to get leads, but we would go on the road a lot. I would go with Angelo, that was my boss. And I learned a ton from them.

[00:21:42] So, yeah. The way Angelo like conducted a meeting when he walked in, like you can translate that to anything to inside sales. It doesn’t matter. He was the man and it, it came so naturally. So yeah, I’ve always learned a ton. I loved my experience at NetX. Like ultimately I was ready to move to a new type of solution and a new [00:22:00] thing that like would be a better fit for me in terms of company size, 

[00:22:03] things like that. They were very small, so, but great times at NetX and very appreciative of that for sure.

[00:22:11] Marc Gonyea: [00:22:11] What 

[00:22:12] happened next? 

[00:22:14] Sadie Kneuper: [00:22:14] NetX, next. I was looking at companies in New York. It’s overwhelming. There’s a ton of startups. They all seem to be like apps. I don’t know what they do. So you just kind of try to learn from the website. So I ended up finding CB Insights after a couple months through built in nyc.com. So pretty cool website all through like well-rated startups. 

[00:22:35] Marc Gonyea: [00:22:35] Yeah, we use it to source names. The call 

[00:22:38] from memoryBlue. 

[00:22:40] No. 

[00:22:40] Yeah. 

[00:22:41] Sadie Kneuper: [00:22:41] I like that. 

[00:22:42] So yeah, I read about them. You know, you go to a website, you still don’t fully understand what a company does typically. That don’t really know, but I kind of like got the basis. I knew they were like a platform that was playing in some sort of like FinTech investment startup type thing, like private market.

[00:22:57] I thought that was really interesting. Something like [00:23:00] I’m interested in. So I went for an interview there after I did the phone interview. I wanted to be an AE right away. There’s tears. There’s like an A3, A2 A1. One’s the highest, three is typically reserved for like internal. So SDRs will move to like A3.

[00:23:16] They didn’t let me be an A3 right away. They said, “All right, you can come in and be a senior SDR, but just for a couple of months if you hit your quota, every month.”, I was like, “Oh my God.” But it’s probably in hindsight smarter. You really have to learn a lot before you become an AE anywhere, but especially I think here. So.

[00:23:35] Chris Corcoran: [00:23:35] So let’s talk, talk to us a little bit about that. Like, what did you learn as the senior SDR and, and when, when you became an AE, what were you thankful for that, for that senior SDR experience? 

[00:23:46] Sadie Kneuper: [00:23:46] It’s very interesting because CB Insights, like, I don’t know, people say this is a hard sale. I don’t know because you know, I’ve been here. But when people come from the outside, it’s been so tough for them. It’s like, we don’t, we don’t have a lot of success. [00:24:00] Like, I don’t want to say that, but it’s been tough.

[00:24:02] And it’s been way more successful coming from the inside. So I’ll give one example. I didn’t know there was like corporate innovation teams you know, across the board. Like, I dunno, I dunno. I just didn’t know that. Now I know that like, that’s one of our prospects or our teams, so it’s like venture innovation strategy.

[00:24:19] Those are main teams. I came from like IT. So I’m learning about that first of all. 

[00:24:23] I don’t need to learn how to run a Boolean search and find 

[00:24:26] these people, but I need to learn, like, what do they care about. Like, who do I want for my AE. 

[00:24:32] Think that takes away, like at least a 

[00:24:34] month or two months of like, just learning 

[00:24:36] that. Then you got to learn to CB Insights and the pitch.

[00:24:39] I think these things would have been tough to throw myself in as an A3 where you have a three month ramp at that time, and then you’re on to quota. So yeah, I think that’s one thing you learn how people talk on the phone to those people for the use cases, but also, just in general, I hadn’t closed before. I had it closed, you know,

[00:24:58] a full sales [00:25:00] cycle. I didn’t end at NetX, but it was a mix. Like there’s very much mixing a lot of like hands on deck. So this was kind of solo, a new sale, learning how to forecast, things like that, like that would have taken time. So a lot of stuff, I think in hindsight.

[00:25:19] Chris Corcoran: [00:25:19] Very good. And so talk to us a little bit about that migration to becoming an AE. 

[00:25:23] Sadie Kneuper: [00:25:23] That was great. So I said, “Okay, I’ll be a senior SDR and I’ll hit quota every month.” Like that’s just team. Like I would be there to hit quota if I had to until 8:00 PM, but like, it was going to happen. So. So it was like, all right, “Let’s get that base up 2.”  I’m a new so six months or something as a senior CR, whatever every month.

[00:25:45] Yeah. And then a chance, had to do the interview and internal interview to become A3. It’s like a boardroom setting. Like, “I know all you guys. Like you’re friendly, but it’s not today.” Like one of the nicest directors was [00:26:00] literally like tried to be so mean. He like didn’t smile, but I did it on a Friday and he like messed up at one point and I had to throw in a joke, but it was still terrified.

[00:26:10] He was like, “Let’s say like we, you get the job. Like you start tomorrow, you get a bunch of accounts. Like, what are you doing?” You know, some, some hard ass question, whatever. And I was like, “Tomorrow is a Saturday, though.” That’s only time that he like, “Crap”, and smile. It’s like, “Dude, you’re like the nicest guy.” Anyway so that was kind of a tough interview, but 

[00:26:30] you kind of knew, you got a vibe that you were going to 

[00:26:33] like get it, potentially. Like just, they wanted you to get, like they were ready for you to get it. 

[00:26:38] Marc Gonyea: [00:26:38] Well, I’m sure you came in there and  crushed it,

[00:26:41] during the SDR, ’cause you had 

[00:26:42] the memoryBlue skills. Then you 

[00:26:44] had the 

[00:26:44] skills at NetX and then 

[00:26:46] you really wanted to do it. And you’re just like, “I know I’m going to get there”. So of course they want someone like you to do it, but you got to go through the process. 

[00:26:53] Sadie Kneuper: [00:26:53] For sure. Yeah, I was, I was ready, definitely. And I was, so [00:27:00] at that point it was me who was interviewing and one other guy. We’re relatively like small at that point, I think like 180 to 120. So sales was a portion of that. So yeah, I got it. I got the job, but you know, they, they keep you on your toes for a couple of days.

[00:27:13] It’s like, “This is a weekend. Like, I guess I’ll either like go rage or I’ll like watch TV, like think about stuff.” But yeah, it was good. It was a pretty straight forward like interview process, but they kind of try to grill you. But then the work starts, like you gotta grind for that first three months.

[00:27:29] Like that ramp is, you don’t know, you don’t know everything like you might not. It’s so weird. I watched so many demos where my AEs were demoing as I was an SDR. And then you translate that into you demoing and it’s just so funny, like. You either don’t know where to go, even though you know the product or you’re constantly trying to make some sort of order like every call is going to go the same and like, “Let me feature the shit out of everything.

[00:27:56] Let me feature demo like crazy.” So now I do a lot of trainings with [00:28:00] new AEs, like a lot. Oh gosh. I need to hit quota guys. Like I’m doing too many trainings, but so I give it hence feedback. Like, like long list of feedback ’cause I love it so much, but you know, it’s feature demos. Like they are so good.

[00:28:14] They’re better than when I started, just in terms of getting the product really fast. I was like, “You know everything though. But like, hold that in and remember that you’re like having a conversation. Like literally, I don’t know if it helps you to go and care more, whatever, but like take a step back and like, just figure out like what they want.

[00:28:30] Like you can talk for like, 10 minutes about the platform itself.” Like, it’s, it’s very interesting. I think the biggest thing is trying to order the platform. I tried to do that. I had a list like, “Then I’m going to go here, then I’m going to go here.” No, it doesn’t happen that way. That’s for sure.

[00:28:48] Chris Corcoran: [00:28:48] And tell for the listeners, tell them a little bit about what CS Insights does. What problem do you, guys, solve? CB Thank you. 

[00:28:57] Sadie Kneuper: [00:28:57] That’s okay. It is a funny, a funny [00:29:00] title. It used to be Chubby Brain. That’s what the CB stood for. Very, they had to change that. So CB Insights, what they do? So it’s a web based platform. I know that sounds really, really specific and teams, like I mentioned before, like innovation strategy ventures will use us in different ways, but

[00:29:17] very much like private market and innovation focused, so forward-thinking. So with that, we’ll be tracking private company data, 

[00:29:24] which is huge things like partnerships, investments, all of that valuation, if we can source it. So very much like heavy on the sourcing, public company information, like you can find that online, we track that in like a holistic way that within the platform.

[00:29:38] And then also partnerships like Amazon has like a hundred thousand partnerships. I don’t know, like the systematic approach to that is awesome. It’s what they do before they enter a new market. So we’re trying to give people insights into what strategy they need to make based on build-by partner, based on tracking like trends.

[00:29:58] So we have research also. [00:30:00] Our ALS team does research to combine with that data piece that you can use in the platform. So it’s really cool. So yeah, that’s like a high level of what we do. 

[00:30:08] Chris Corcoran: [00:30:08] And so who buys this stuff? 

[00:30:10] Sadie Kneuper: [00:30:10] Yeah. So we’re actually try, you know, get to pivot into more of a marketplace, potentially. If I can say that. Yeah, I can say that.

[00:30:17] Yeah. It’s public. So we might end up trying to kind of be more like, “Let’s think about vendors, let’s think about IT.” Like we’re not going to Gartner. We don’t want to be like, traditional like that, but thinking about expanding teams, because right now, to answer your question, the teams we mostly sell to will be insights providers, which is strategy innovation, 

[00:30:37] kind of like a market research could be in there.

[00:30:39] They be competitive in Dell. They’re basically trying to find out like, “Should we go into this market?” 

[00:30:45] “I don’t know.” What, what technologies are popping up? Maybe even companies to partner with usually. And then you got like the venture side, M&A, I guess. 

[00:30:53] I don’t, I don’t mess with M&A and Corp Dev.

[00:30:56] It’s not a good use case. But venture, my 

[00:30:58] favorite team is South [00:31:00] Corporate Venture. So you think about like, one of my accounts is a big 

[00:31:03] bank, let’s say They probably have a venture team within the bank. It might be called something 

[00:31:07] different. That’s where your prospecting comes in, guys. Gotta be an SDR, always.

[00:31:11] You find that venture team, they’re looking at startups. Like they want to maybe  invest, probably invest or partner with them. So you look at how many partnerships they’ve done across different maybe markets like, FinTech, Healthcare. Like, “Damn, this company’s sweet, not just a bank anymore.” That’s venture to me.

[00:31:30] They’re doing all that 

[00:31:31] like innovation. So yeah, fun. Okay. 

[00:31:40] Marc Gonyea: [00:31:40] What was it like closing your first 

[00:31:41] deal? Do you remember that? 

[00:31:43] Sadie Kneuper: [00:31:43] I remember it. It was Sojitz corporation, Japan. So my first deal, my first deal  is funny because I think they still do this very much, but I feel like my boss was like J, he was like, “Jesus, take the wheel.” [00:32:00] I’m like, it definitely was demoing, but he’s like, “Haa,” you know, they definitely are still hovering a little bit.

[00:32:06] But I needed that. Now I let go of that too quick. They tell me I need to add people to calls more. I’m like quite dependent, I guess, in that way. But that was a 

[00:32:15] great deal. So we got like 10 Japanese guys on the phone. Now I know that’s like, that’s the thing in Japan. But that was my first call.

[00:32:23] So like, “Whoa, we got a squad up in here.” We showed like an awesome demo. They had to 

[00:32:27] check like everyone to give a ‘Yes’. It was a big deal too for my first one. Like, I was very happy at like, it was really exciting. Like everyone was so pumped and I closed it on like my quarter ramp. So I had three months to like ramp.

[00:32:40] If you close anything during that time, it was just like 

[00:32:42] gravy. But I closed down like the first month right after 

[00:32:45] that. So I was like, “Yes, let’s freaking go.” It was awesome. Just great moment.

[00:32:49] Marc Gonyea: [00:32:49] When you closed your first deal, like in that space, of that company? I know you’ve done done some

[00:32:55] stuff at the other place. What knowing that, like, what advice would you go back and [00:33:00] give yourself like your first day at 

[00:33:02] memoryBlue? 

[00:33:04] Sadie Kneuper: [00:33:04] Whoa. That was trippy question. 

[00:33:06] Marc Gonyea: [00:33:06] Yeah, ’cause then everybody spends all 

[00:33:08] this time, “

[00:33:09] When I close one of my, when I close 

[00:33:10] my deals, 

[00:33:10] when I close my, when I close the work”. Like 

[00:33:13] no one, so 

[00:33:14] you got that point 

[00:33:14] in your career and you’re living in New York city. We’re going to have to, that’s 

[00:33:17] your fund to company. 

[00:33:18] Like, what advice would you go back and 

[00:33:20] get the Sadie like that first day before you walked in the, you know, 

[00:33:23] preboon? 

[00:33:25] Sadie Kneuper: [00:33:25] Preboon. yeah, I’d probably say like, that’s a good question. I’d probably say like, just honestly, I think when you sell a deal, like I was watching my director do this, like, “Just listen, like you learn so much more from listening.” I think man, so many salespeople are just chat, chat, chat. They don’t really take a step back.

[00:33:46] I think this is where be the people person comes in. I don’t think a lot of people are 

[00:33:50] actually really good with people like they think they are. It’s very emotional intelligence related. So I think just like listening. It doesn’t mean I’m the best listener, [00:34:00] but I’m going to crack a joke. I’m going to like, you know, fly around a little bit, have some fun, got to have some fun.

[00:34:06] I’m a weird at salesperson I’m not like the traditional following the document. I think I’m like really pissing a lot of people off, but I want to listen to like the people and just like, figure out like what like they’re thinking, like what’s going to help like them. 

[00:34:19] I don’t know. You step away from your platform or 

[00:34:21] whatever you’re selling for a little bit and you learn a lot more.

[00:34:25] so I would say that for sure.

[00:34:29] Marc Gonyea: [00:34:29] And is that your most memorable win? Your first one? What’s your 

[00:34:33] most win? 

[00:34:36] Sadie Kneuper: [00:34:36] Okay. So that might be, there’s there’s like three. That’s one of them, ’cause like it was the first at CB Insights 

[00:34:42] Marc Gonyea: [00:34:42] Close a lot of deals. It 

[00:34:43] must be nice. 

[00:34:46] Sadie Kneuper: [00:34:46] Another one is NetX and this hurts me. So I sourced and like this became like a huge deal. So like I said before, like it was going to be my deal, but like also a bunch of other people had to do stuff just [00:35:00] ’cause we’re like, “It’s hardware, everything like that.”

[00:35:03] So I sourced this and it ended up being like 1.4 million or something. 

[00:35:09] I was like, “All right, I’m doing the math.” 

[00:35:12] Like this looks good. So it took so long to get there. In the end, I got like 4%. I can’t remember. I got like $4,000 or something. It was like, “What the hell is this shit?” But it was because like during that process, Angelo was doing 

[00:35:28] so much work.

[00:35:28] And like, I was so thankful for that because, you know, we like, “God, it takes a lot of hands on deck.” But somehow it went like more so to our partner, like Veritas got more of like the, it was, yeah, it was kind of a mess, but that like moment of being like, “Damn, that is a big, big deal.” And like I identified that person.

[00:35:50] I don’t know, it was a lot of like pride there. And then I’d say, “No, this one’s fun.” This is probably my favorite. So at CB Insights, my third deal that I’ll say is Hong Kong [00:36:00] Science and Technology Parks, kind of wild. I don’t think a lot of people would pick up that account. Pick it up at Council’s like my favorite thing, by the way.

[00:36:07] Marc Gonyea: [00:36:07] What does that mean? What does that mean? 

[00:36:10] Sadie Kneuper: [00:36:10] So, I don’t think I’d be as successful at like CB Insights truly if they just dropped accounts into my name. You know, and I had to keep those accounts, which they kind of have tested before and I’m like, “Don’t do it to me.” I find, like I read a lot, I find these companies that I just like see would, would want to be at CB, like.

[00:36:29] Like I see a fit. 

[00:36:30] it’s probably the best thing. It’s the best thing, I’m best at that. You know, it’s the only thing I’m good at is identifying those. Yeah.

[00:36:38] Marc Gonyea: [00:36:38] We’ll we’ll we’ll we’ll wait, hold on. And okay. You said you read a lot. What do you, 

[00:36:40] what do you read? 

[00:36:43] Sadie Kneuper: [00:36:43] Okay. So I read, first of all, I can just type in my account and put innovation. So, you know, people are lazy and they don’t do anything with their acc or they don’t go deep enough their accounts. That’s another thing. But what I read, so I’ll read news like Tech in Asia. I work a lot in Asia by the way,

[00:36:58] payments.com, [00:37:00] Yahoo. Yahoo for like insights. I use our platform, to find out who are the biggest investors in XYZ space or that are they tied to corporation. Like, 

[00:37:10] are they VC arm? A lot of random lists, like I’ll look at events, innovation events, find who’s speaking, and who’s going to those events and then see if those accounts 

[00:37:18] are free. Yeah. And then just like news in general on anything tech, like Tech Trends, TechCrunch, stuff like 

[00:37:24] that.

[00:37:25] Marc Gonyea: [00:37:25] Loose balls, Corcoran.

[00:37:27] Chris Corcoran: [00:37:27] I love it. 

[00:37:28] Marc Gonyea: [00:37:28] He’s picking up on the hustle and dive in after these loose balls, 

[00:37:31] Chris Corcoran: [00:37:31] Got all the floor burns. 

[00:37:32] Marc Gonyea: [00:37:32] Crushing into the scores 

[00:37:34] table. 

[00:37:36] Sadie Kneuper: [00:37:36] Yes, exactly. but yeah, that’s very much like the insights reading too. ‘Cause I gotta like, you know, I want to find some 

[00:37:42] stuff, but it’s fun. It’s cool to see. 

[00:37:44] Marc Gonyea: [00:37:44] So you pick up that, that you pick it up accounts and Sadie’s just like reading and being curious as hell and calling people and 

[00:37:50] emailing people. 

[00:37:52] Sadie Kneuper: [00:37:52] Yeah. Yeah. So like I loved Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks. So random. They’re like the Jurassic park of Hong Kong. [00:38:00] I got pictured them all, like lab, like separate labs, but they’re like tech and shit. And it’s like, awesome. So yeah, I love Asia too that’s already my move. So I didn’t know they were going to get such a, like, they were going to go up to a fat deal though.

[00:38:15] You know, the last opt, like the last person that owned the account, like they were struggling for 50 K, like they ended up by… So they long story short, they end up buying for 266 K. So it’s right big for the year, a thousand. I said K. Okay. That’s fun. So for memory or for CB Insights, that’s our highest package,

[00:38:35] it’s called executive, it’s 2.65. But I worked with them on the Hong Kong dollar translation, so 2.66. But yeah, it was great. I mean, I was WhatsApping by champion every day, felt like we were in a relationship and I don’t know why he doesn’t reach out anymore, you know? 

[00:38:49] Chris Corcoran: [00:38:49] Yeah. 

[00:38:51] Sadie Kneuper: [00:38:51] Oh, we had something good, but yeah, WhatsApp is one of a lot of Hong Kong or Asia will use.

[00:38:57] We chat on WhatsApp. He would tell me secrets on there. [00:39:00] We went through an RFP, so he would tell me like, “You guys are the chosen vendor, but like, please don’t email anything about that because it’s not public, you know?” So I dunno, it was just a deeply built relationship and we worked really hard on that deal.

[00:39:14] Like I had a lot of hands on that, a lot of analysts work, stuff like that. But that was amazing. And it’s, it’s how I got that moneymaker award or whatever, whatever it’s called. Show me the money. 

[00:39:24] Marc Gonyea: [00:39:24] Yes. W what 

[00:39:26] was that award for? 

[00:39:28] Sadie Kneuper: [00:39:28] For ARR. So the highest I had the highest average, like a deal size. Basically like number, like 

[00:39:35] 80,000 average or something like that, or 85 across the year.

[00:39:40] So that was Hong Kong helping me out with that 2.65, 

[00:39:43] Marc Gonyea: [00:39:43] That’s great. Out, out of the whole Salesforce, the whole team? Excellent. And you’ve been at CB for awhile. Like what, what is it about there in you’re working your way up the food chain right now you’re an enterprise account executive? It looks like you got promoted this year. [00:40:00] How does it, how does that happen?

[00:40:02] I mean, how many deals did you 

[00:40:03] close as an AE, 

[00:40:04] over two 

[00:40:05] and a half years?

[00:40:06] Sadie Kneuper: [00:40:06] I got the Excel tracker. I can send it to you. No, not  now you can find some accounts. So yeah, I started as an E3 December, November. so you said it’s been three. Yeah. So you, E3 is the hardest. I’m not going to lie. Like, I mean, it’s not the hardest your quota goes up clearly, but E3 is when you ramp, like you figure out if this is like a fit for you Account Executive or Account Executive at CB Insights too.

[00:40:30] There’s a lot of elements. But anyway, how you do that is like, this sounds like cliche, but it’s hard work. Like I interview potential AEs now, quite often, for CB Insights. And it’s so hard because they ask you that question. You’re like I’ve been, I’m being serious. Like, “Are you going to work your ass off?”

[00:40:46] Like, I don’t know. I don’t know if you are. I can’t, like, not be successful, I guess, in my mind. I’m like kind of a psycho like I’m really hard on myself. Not in a bad way, like kind of in [00:41:00] a motivational way, but probably too much, but I will work my ass off, like, I will if I’m into something. So you have to have that, like, that’s what a hundred percent. You also have to be like self-sufficient or like, want to learn some things on your own.

[00:41:14] Like he ask questions for sure. But you know, 

[00:41:18] you got to like Google. So if we have Google, I don’t really don’t understand sometimes. I come up, it’s appalling. 

[00:41:27] Marc Gonyea: [00:41:27] You sound like 

[00:41:28] Chris. Okay. 

[00:41:29] Sadie Kneuper: [00:41:29] It’s just crazy. It’s like, why? Like what the hell, 

[00:41:32] man? Yeah, my mom would be like, “Back in my day, we had to write a letter, but walk five miles in the snow to school.”

[00:41:38] Everyone did that apparently. 

[00:41:40] Marc Gonyea: [00:41:40] Use a 

[00:41:40] dictionary. 

[00:41:42] Sadie Kneuper: [00:41:42] But yeah, I’m getting off topic, 

[00:41:44] Marc Gonyea: [00:41:44] No, you’re not. This is that you’re hitting on 

[00:41:46] points that people need to hear. 

[00:41:48] Sadie Kneuper: [00:41:48] Yeah. I think it’s just like, honestly, people like blow my mind with like what they expect. They’re asking me, like, you know, “How many hours do you work a week?” Like in an interview. Like their question is [00:42:00] like, “What about work-life balance?” Like, you know, I get it, but like ask me some questions about like the AE role too,

[00:42:06] before like the work life balance. Because like, otherwise, like, I don’t know what I’m supposed to tell you right now. So I think it’s like, you know, in the beginning, I don’t think you should even be addressing that. Like you’re coming to get an AE role, like, what do you want? But but yeah. So what I’ve interviewed people, I’ve learned a lot about that.

[00:42:21] You really have to work hard. You have to be curious, use your resources. Like that’s probably something that I have not the best at, but I am in a way. I’m listening to calls and doing a lot of 

[00:42:31] stuff to get, try to get better. But you know, you can use leverage people, like people who are good at it. Like, they closed a lot of deals 

[00:42:40] because they they’re using the right people to push those along.

[00:42:43] So, yeah, I 

[00:42:44] think that stuff. Be curious always, try to get better always. 

[00:42:49] Chris Corcoran: [00:42:49] So what do you what do you look for when you’re interviewing 

[00:42:51] an AE or want to be AEs? Talk to us a little bit about 

[00:42:54] what you’re looking for. What things are 

[00:42:56] do you like, and what things are knockouts?

[00:42:59] Sadie Kneuper: [00:42:59] Yep. [00:43:00] So I’m like turned 

[00:43:01] off like right away. If they can’t like high-level talk about CB 

[00:43:06] Insights, like, I don’t expect to pitch at all, but like, you’d be like surprised by how many people come 

[00:43:13] like that. Just not knowing anything. I’m like, “Oh My Gosh.” So that just seems like another 

[00:43:18] interview that they want to do.

[00:43:20] So I’d say that is my number one. Like I’ll always give you a ‘No’ if it was bad, 

[00:43:24] Number two, like, what I look for is it’s hard to see like hard 

[00:43:28] work kind of, but I feel like you can see passion though. So I’m not, I don’t have like a high voice. I feel like that comes across as like giddy and passionate and like crazy hype about something.

[00:43:37] And I remember 

[00:43:38] Ben de Caskey was like confused with my interview. 

[00:43:42] He was great. He was like, “Yo, you’re really like so chill.” It was like, 

[00:43:45] “Did you want the job?” I was like, “Yeah, I 

[00:43:48] did.” but yeah, that 

[00:43:49] was funny. So I guess I give off that vibe, I don’t know. But I think he could see passion because somebody did their homework first of all, bright and passionate,

[00:43:58] but the questions they ask… I’m big on [00:44:00] like the questions at the end, we leave 10 minutes out of my 30 minute interview for those, you learn a 

[00:44:05] lot in those questions. And I think the way they think about like, just sales in general, so like, “Do you guys like selling to like your use case? Like what do you find that you know, customers want?

[00:44:18] Or like who do you like face?” Questions are good, but to tell you the truth Chris, it is hard to assess like hard work 

[00:44:25] on an interview. So now I’ve kind of seen that pan out sometimes. That’s tough. I’m sure you guys know this like interview people. Like, I don’t know, it’s tough. What do you guys look for? Do you guys get asked questions during this?

[00:44:39] Chris Corcoran: [00:44:39] W, well, I, I look for, “Does this person remind me of Sadie?” And it’s a full, it’s a 

[00:44:43] ‘Yes’.

[00:44:45] Sadie Kneuper: [00:44:45] Can this person fit at Boon? I don’t know.

[00:44:49] Marc Gonyea: [00:44:49] Well, I mean, you remember, you and I were talking about you like, you were surprised, I remembered to you with 

[00:44:53] the PVI 

[00:44:54] and we did talk about 

[00:44:55] sports. I mean, you had your basketball thing. I remember you being a 

[00:44:57] hustler with sports. And 

[00:44:58] I remember you being from a big [00:45:00] family and some of the, sometimes some of those things can be helpful or not.

[00:45:04] You know, the sports thing helps. I mean, you don’t have to be a professional 

[00:45:06] athlete that nobody is like. And 

[00:45:08] I remember you, I remember you being confident that you were good. So I 

[00:45:12] was like, “I’m  supposed to be good. She’s 

[00:45:13] got some confidence,” but like, you still have to work hard to play basketball at a Catholic school in Northern Virginia.

[00:45:18] Like it’s not somebody, somebody else wants to play more than you do. So you got to kind of learn to compete. And then I, then you ran for graduate 

[00:45:25] sneaky, smart. To Tommy Gassman, Robbie Connors. Like, I got, 

[00:45:32] we got a lot of sneaky, smart 

[00:45:33] Rafford grads at memoryBlue. So like, 

[00:45:35] if you get out of Rafford in four years, you know what, you 

[00:45:37] probably do some things right. 

[00:45:39] Sadie Kneuper: [00:45:39] That’s actually really true. You don’t even do the fifth year loop around. 

[00:45:43] Marc Gonyea: [00:45:43] No. 

[00:45:43] Sadie Kneuper: [00:45:43] Yeah, 

[00:45:44] Marc Gonyea: [00:45:44] But it’s hard, but it’s hard to tell. You don’t know, interested in an interview, how hard someone 

[00:45:48] can work. But I think I wrote it down. 

[00:45:50] You can’t see hard work, but you can see 

[00:45:51] passion. 

[00:45:54] Sadie Kneuper: [00:45:54] That’s cool. That’s going to make me sound really intellectual.

[00:45:58] Marc Gonyea: [00:45:58] I mean, you are. You don’t have to act like you’re [00:46:00] not. You’ve got that little humble vibe going. This is why you were with us 

[00:46:02] 15 months with no problems and crushed, crushed your quota. Is that bad? Your were here months. It says you could, you stuck to what you said you were going to do it. That’s actually a badge of honor.

[00:46:11] I think It 

[00:46:12] gives you some perspective in life.

[00:46:14] Sadie Kneuper: [00:46:14] It was a badge of honor. I wear it daily. 

[00:46:16] Marc Gonyea: [00:46:16] Every day. 

[00:46:18] Sadie Kneuper: [00:46:18] I wish I could 

[00:46:18] see like some of the stats back then. You guys will have… 

[00:46:21] Marc Gonyea: [00:46:21] Oh no, we lost you for a second. 

[00:46:23] Sadie Kneuper: [00:46:23] Them to

[00:46:23] me. That’d be fun to look at, but yeah. 

[00:46:27] Marc Gonyea: [00:46:27] Oh, the KPIs, are your 

[00:46:29] KPIs, like your calls, your calls?

[00:46:31] Sadie Kneuper: [00:46:31] Well, it also, like you said, I hit quota every month. I want to see like the percentages. You know, I don’t know if you still do it.

[00:46:37] We have that chart. You guys are going to send it out like once a week.

[00:46:40] Chris Corcoran: [00:46:40] Oh yeah. 

[00:46:41] Sadie Kneuper: [00:46:41] See our percentages. Everybody’s like, “God, why do you have 25% already?” So fun. 

[00:46:49] So if… 

[00:46:49] Marc Gonyea: [00:46:49] It is fun. Do you got a good…, so do you have SDRs you work 

[00:46:52] with now, in your 

[00:46:52] role?

[00:46:53] Sadie Kneuper: [00:46:53] Yeah, I do. So two to now three dedicated SDRs. 

[00:46:59] But we’ve [00:47:00] mixed it up. We’ve had some like different things going on in the last 

[00:47:03] few, try different things.

[00:47:05] Marc Gonyea: [00:47:05] That’s a 

[00:47:05] bummer. Hey Sadie, dial back 

[00:47:07] in if you can hear us. Is that… Hey Sadie? 

[00:47:14] Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, we lost you for a second there when I asked you, did you have SDRs, do 

[00:47:18] you have 

[00:47:18] SDRs working 

[00:47:18] for you now? 

[00:47:20] Sadie Kneuper: [00:47:20] Yeah. Yes, I do. So I’ve three dedicated SDRs, and they’ve changed it up like over the last few years. So I’ve had a couple of different SDRs, but it’s pretty much always been like two or three dedicated throughout 

[00:47:32] my time at CB Insights. Then you have some inbound every once in a while that just get 

[00:47:36] routed to you, could be different SDR. 

[00:47:38]

[00:47:38] Marc Gonyea: [00:47:38] What do you tell those those sales, those SDRs that are 

[00:47:41] working for you, making calls for you? What do you tell them? What type of advice 

[00:47:44] do you 

[00:47:45] give them? 

[00:47:47] Sadie Kneuper: [00:47:47] Yeah, a lot of advice. I really care about, like us both getting better always. They teach me things too, which is important. I try to, like, I know they’re going to be nervous for sure in the beginning, [00:48:00] but I push them a little bit. I get on the calls with them a lot in the beginning, despite who it is, unless it’s like a Chief Innovation Officer, probably going to take it pretty quick.

[00:48:09] But I like to get on calls, hear them. I’m slacking them, I’m there for them, but I want to push them a little bit. I’ll even tell them what to say throughout. It helps them just learn how to talk to people that like these roles, like they don’t like, you don’t have to worry. Like, it’s just a person. It’s 

[00:48:26] like your dad or something. Not 

[00:48:28] your dad, but, you know. So the things I teach them though are use cases.

[00:48:32] I think it’s like one of the most important things for CB Insights. You really have to like at least know high level, what a venture team would want, ideally versus like innovation and then you just learn everything else. Like you have your stuff in your head, you ask if that’s correct and then you get some feedback you go from there.

[00:48:50] Organization very important, teach them about organization though we don’t let anything slip through the cracks. Yeah, being a human, organization, use [00:49:00] case I think those are the big ones I would say. And then you get into the nitty gritty of like calls and stuff, and little things they could have done different. Emails, tighten it up, tighten everything up.

[00:49:10] I learned to stop putting ‘just’ in my emails. I was like, “What is this doing here?” Somebody taught me that, I loved it. Yeah, there’s certain things you can do that’ll catch people’s eyes. And like, I’m always telling them, “You know what? We didn’t need an 8:00 AM.” Like don’t give me an 8:00 AM, but no. The lesson is basically their time is so important,

[00:49:30] like just as valuable as these people, like these people… Yeah, I know that’s a lot more money than you, but that’s important. Like, don’t, don’t be a wallflower or whatever. You know, you’re 

[00:49:41] kinda like that in the beginning as an SDR, you like “Don’t think you’re important.” or something like. So it comes across in the emails and stuff, your confidence,

[00:49:47] so that’s important.

[00:49:49] Marc Gonyea: [00:49:49] Classic advice, that’s, we give that advice 

[00:49:50] to people here.

[00:49:52] Sadie Kneuper: [00:49:52] Yeah. The best AEs work well with their SDRs. Like they don’t say, “My SDR works for me.” Like, first of all, you’re a piece of shit. [00:50:00] Like let’s just out of control. But no, I usually, like when I close a deal, like we do they deals on the top and stuff. I’m also like out of control of my SDRs though. I’m like, “What did you think about the calls?

[00:50:12] Like dad?” I don’t know. I’m very weird, very weird. Like, “Yahtzee let’s go.” I make them laugh too much, like on Slack or on Discoin. Okay. Well, he…, like, “Stop flirting with this girl, you know.” They look at the screen and can tell them, they’re like, “Oh my God, we got 

[00:50:29] there on video.” I’m horrible,

[00:50:32] but we have a lot of 

[00:50:33] fun. So who do you think they want to be working with? Let’s go.

[00:50:38] Marc Gonyea: [00:50:38] That’s right. Who they want to work with? 

[00:50:41] Right? And who and who do they 

[00:50:42] want to learn from? There’s like a 

[00:50:44] perfect blend of having 

[00:50:44] fun and learning from. 

[00:50:47] Sadie Kneuper: [00:50:47] Oh, thank you. So are you, Marc and Chris. 

[00:50:51]

[00:50:51] Chris Corcoran: [00:50:51] So Sadie, so another part of your role sounds like it’s like you help new AEs learn how to demo or, or you give them feedback on their demo. What are some of the things that you [00:51:00] like on demos and what are the things that you try to get your, the new way to stop doing on demos? 

[00:51:05] Sadie Kneuper: [00:51:05] Yeah. So like the feature pushing, I think you know, everyone could be guilty of that for sure. Like, I still sometimes like ramble on for sure, but I think when you have a use case, you’re better at what to show. But I think it’s more so like,… Okay, this is my biggest thing I tell every AE this. When you jump into the platform, like, don’t start with like a feature, like give them a little bit of like, “Hey, so we’re in the platform.

[00:51:31] This is like, you know, my platform, yours like diff…” Like where the hell are we? Like, they don’t know anything. So even when you pitch our research, they’re like fly and into like a FinTech report. Like, “No, no, no, back up. Go to our portal.” And like, tell them like the cadence of the research. Like how often will they even get research?

[00:51:49] Who does it, like, what’s it on?” Like you have to start like very high level because like a super, like, nobody knows shit. Like if I… Like everyone’s coming from Gartner, whatever [00:52:00] consultants anything about like research, like it’s different though. Like talk to everyone, like they don’t know anything at 

[00:52:05] first. And then, or ask them, but like, nah, just assume like be very high level.

[00:52:11] I hate also all the like data, like algorithm, all 

[00:52:15] those like words. Like when we describe certain things, it’s like, they’re reading off of 

[00:52:19] that piece of paper. Like, “Have you heard of our mosaic score? 

[00:52:23] All right, let me tell you about 

[00:52:24] it, it’s an algorithm by the national science 

[00:52:26] foundation or something.”

[00:52:28] I don’t like all that. I’m just like, it’s the way we 

[00:52:30] rate like the hell of a private company. And then I could like get into some other stuff, but like they’re blacking out when you’re 

[00:52:36] starting to say that, the 

[00:52:38] prospect’s gone. So yeah, things like that are themes 

[00:52:42] across the board. I’ve I actually have a story,

[00:52:47] it kind of ties 

[00:52:47] into that. 

[00:52:49] Chris Corcoran: [00:52:49] Yeah,

[00:52:49] please. 

[00:52:51] Sadie Kneuper: [00:52:51] Somebody, I don’t remember who it was, may have been Brandon. 

[00:52:56] Brandon Eyring right? This his last…

[00:52:58] Marc Gonyea: [00:52:58] Taylor? 

[00:53:00] [00:52:59] Sadie Kneuper: [00:52:59] Brandon 

[00:53:00] like Eyring. Think is… 

[00:53:02] Marc Gonyea: [00:53:02] Brandon who? Oh, Brandon Eyring. Okay. Yeah. Brandon. All right. 

[00:53:05] All right, please, 

[00:53:06] please, 

[00:53:07] tell us. 

[00:53:07] Sadie Kneuper: [00:53:07] Think it, I think it was him. So we were at one of those trainings. We did like a call review. Like he was talking to a prospect, he was just starting to pitch and then he fell off his chair. He fell off his chair, he’s so loud. He was like, “God damn.” He’s like, “Shit.” Like cracking up. He’s like, “I just solved my chair.

[00:53:28] I’m sorry about that.” Like now, like he’s just everything. So I just think like, that was so funny. Like, I don’t know, like the human thing. I know it’s cheesy, whatever it was like ‘hi hi’ with on the phone on a cold call. Like that was so funny to the point where I was like, “I gotta do that like once a week.” because I don’t know,

[00:53:46] that was just the best. Like thinking about what a prospect goes through every day. They’re like, “That was the best call my day. Like I just like busted his ass.” That was great.

[00:53:57] Chris Corcoran: [00:53:57] So Sadie, Brandon’s back with memoryBlue, he’s [00:54:00] in the, he’s a sales manager for us and, and he, he, he still does that once a week. 

[00:54:06] Sadie Kneuper: [00:54:06] God. He, he I think I saw that actually. I started listening to his podcast a little bit 

[00:54:12] and yeah, and he’s, he’s a, and married to Austin, you guys are forming… 

[00:54:18] You should get paid for that, right? You out…

[00:54:20] Marc Gonyea: [00:54:20] We get, we get them to come back here and work here and we allow them to bring his, his newborn daughter on 

[00:54:25] calls 

[00:54:25] every now and then.

[00:54:27] Sadie Kneuper: [00:54:27] Do they have the daughter too? Oh, I know. Wow. 

[00:54:30] Marc Gonyea: [00:54:30] Crazy. 

[00:54:32] Sadie Kneuper: [00:54:32] That’s amazing. Source of love. 

[00:54:34] Marc Gonyea: [00:54:34] Hey Sadie. So you’ve been at CB Insights for three and a half years. People, that, that’s a good that’s, that’s a great amount of time and I love it ’cause you’ve moved up the food chain there, right? You’re interviewing people, you’re mentoring people, you’re doing all sorts of cool shit. There are people who like can’t, you know, in three and a half years they’ll have three jobs or two jobs,

[00:54:56] right? W w what, what are some of the, why [00:55:00] do I want 

[00:55:00] to say they’re mistakes, maybe they’re mistakes. What are 

[00:55:02] the mistakes, the reasons why people make those decisions to leave? Like, you know, these are your peers kind of industry, the ones you worked with 

[00:55:09] the memoryBlue or ones 

[00:55:09] you’ve worked with along the way. Like a lot of people do that. ‘Cause you’ve been, you’ve got a great thing going on there 

[00:55:14] and you’ve stuck around. 

[00:55:16] Sadie Kneuper: [00:55:16] Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think sometimes, you know, sales, like they will get fired. But,… 

[00:55:22] Marc Gonyea: [00:55:22] Right. 

[00:55:23] Sadie Kneuper: [00:55:23] For other reasons, like if they jumped too quickly I think they start getting like, almost like cocky in a reverse way when they’re doing poorly. Like it’s on everyone else except them. Like they have a bad quarter and they’re like, “Well, this company’s going nowhere.”

[00:55:40] So I think a little bit of selfishness probably, I dunno. But I think jumping too early, probably thinking like something else is prettier and I’m not saying it’s not. I think sales, we jump a lot for like product and things like that, maybe growth, so there can be good jumps. But yeah, there’s good and bad jumps.

[00:55:58] Like the people 

[00:55:58] I’ve seen have done [00:56:00] both or like money, I guess, sometimes company size. I think me, personally, like I really have found that I’m passionate about like product and that will be important for me, like just what the company does. I, I never knew that would be the number one. And like the company, like, obviously I don’t want to say culture, but like the company vibe, like the people of course, but that’s hard to assess in an interview.

[00:56:25] So, but yeah, products became really big to me. So I think sometimes people jumped because of that too. I’ve seen, for sure.

[00:56:33] Marc Gonyea: [00:56:33] That’s good. 

[00:56:42] I’m trying to I got a million more questions for you, but I’m curious about, I mean, you you, you told us a little 

[00:56:47] bit, but how do you keep 

[00:56:48] your skills sharp. Like, you seem that you have a high degree of self-awareness for sure. Like what do you do improve your 

[00:56:53] game? 

[00:56:56] Sadie Kneuper: [00:56:56] Yeah. So got to go on dates, you 

[00:56:58] know, keep that social [00:57:00] up. 

[00:57:00] I don’t know 

[00:57:00] if you guys ever said this, but they always said that like at the beginning of CB Insights, 

[00:57:04] like, “You know, be here today is like dating, you know.” I was like, “What?” like, 

[00:57:09] “I’d be doing a lot 

[00:57:10] better than these guys.” 

[00:57:13] but but yeah, I 

[00:57:15] think how do I keep my skills sharp? Like I’ve never, I 

[00:57:17] haven’t even read a sales book, so I’m probably like not the best person to ask, but okay. So let me keep it still sharp. I’m curious though, like, I, that’s why I think I’m a product person, because I need to be like fully invested in like what I’m talking about, for sure. So yeah, I just actually want to like, learn about this space, like kind of always. And we’re also across industry,

[00:57:39] so I think also knowing maybe what, like keeps you on your toes. Maybe I’m a little ADD but I like that I’m talking about like, not just the same industry, I think, I think I just realized that also, and different teams. Like every call is different for me. So like that’s pretty awesome and… for me. I don’t know.

[00:57:57] I think that’s actually, yeah, I’m realizing that now. [00:58:00] And then yeah, how else do I keep my sales skills 

[00:58:02] sharp? Yeah, I read a lot.  I’ve always, I’m probably still one of the highest users of like Gong, which is, I don’t know if you guys have Gong to listen to calls? 

[00:58:12] Marc Gonyea: [00:58:12] Yeah. Tell us about that. We have a very, 

[00:58:14] we have executives. 

[00:58:16] Sadie Kneuper: [00:58:16] It would ease get established, ’cause I was reading the tracker where it shows like how many calls they listened to 

[00:58:21] you. Maybe they don’t listen to as much anymore. I’m sure they do. It’s something else that I’m 

[00:58:26] not, of course though, ’cause they’re successful. 

[00:58:28] But for me I have to, I like 

[00:58:29] listening to calls a lot 

[00:58:30] to, yeah,

[00:58:31] just things that I’m not good at or things that I’m good at, but like they pitched it differently. Whatever it is, I really like listening to calls. So I think that’s a way that I’m, I’m improving, is kind of seeing what people are doing and I may not take that, but that helps me like learn a lot is like, just how they 

[00:58:47] navigate it in something. 

[00:58:49] Marc Gonyea: [00:58:49] Yeah. And Corcoran, I’ll take more Sadie’s any day of the week,

[00:58:53] man. 

[00:58:54] Chris Corcoran: [00:58:54] …doubt. 

[00:58:55] Marc Gonyea: [00:58:55] Sadie, you’re, you’re a pro. You act, you try act like you’re not a pro. I don’t care if you’ve had read any sales books. Like, if you’ve burnt them all. Like, you, you’re a professional. 

[00:59:08] Sadie Kneuper: [00:59:08] I’m a wild professional, maybe. A little wild. 

[00:59:12] Marc Gonyea: [00:59:12] That that works. It’s working. It’s getting you pleasure to work with. I would imagine and I’m pretty 

[00:59:16] sure your clients love you. What a couple of things and we’ll let you get on with, get on with your day. What do you think is like, I don’t know, like where are you going to go with 

[00:59:31] this? Like w w w what do you want…? 

[00:59:33] Sadie Kneuper: [00:59:33] Are you going to ask me what my five-year plan 

[00:59:35] is, Marc? 

[00:59:36] Marc Gonyea: [00:59:36] Like, what you’re going to keep being a rep, do you want to, it sounds like you’d like to manage to a little bit and you’d like to interview like, “W

[00:59:41] where’s Sadie taken this thing?” 

[00:59:43] Sadie Kneuper: [00:59:43] That’s true. I like found that I really like teaching, like, I dunno. It takes me so much time, like I’m very invested in it. I’m like, “Shit, I gotta do my job.” So I’ve kind of thought about that. I think I would need a blend of like, still feeling like I’m in the sale though, which [01:00:00] they actually 

[01:00:00] do kind of have that they definitely have that at CB Insights, 

[01:00:04] in terms of jumping onto calls or 

[01:00:05] like yeah, just advice giving.

[01:00:07] I couldn’t be like a director that’s like not still in it kind of, if that makes sense. But I’m not ready for that yet. I definitely have like a lot of, I think a lot of individual contributing left in me. I don’t know if that’s like two years, like whatever that looks like, but, but I definitely have thought for what you’re saying 

[01:00:26] about like managing and stuff though, for sure.

[01:00:28] And I just know 

[01:00:29] for a fact that I think I wouldn’t want that blend at least for a 

[01:00:31] bit when I do think about management.

[01:00:34]Marc Gonyea: [01:00:34] And then final thing. Women in sales. So like, any client that I guarantee you that worked with you in memoryBlue or any 

[01:00:42] man in person who’s managed you, like I just said and Chris has 

[01:00:45] agreed with way lot more Sadie’s. 

[01:00:47] How do we get more, like Sadies to come into the high tech sales world, because that’s our number 

[01:00:51] one request from clients? 

[01:00:54] Sadie Kneuper: [01:00:54] More women. 

[01:00:55] Marc Gonyea: [01:00:55] Yep. 

[01:00:55] Yep. 

[01:00:56] Chris Corcoran: [01:00:56] It has been for years. 

[01:00:57] Sadie Kneuper: [01:00:57] Because,… oh, that’s interesting. [01:01:00] Okay. So I guess, like, how do you get more like, I don’t know, recruiting like that side of it. I’m sure that’s somebody else’s expertise, but I guess I’d say actually look at people like me and look at our connections or Abby, I remember her. So that’s one way, but I think also it’s like, I guess your existing company and your culture, they’re going to look like, they’re going to look at that,

[01:01:22] like women probably more so like no offense to men, but like, that’s just the way it is. Like if we cut off of her, it’s like a frat culture, like one way or another or another you’re going to have like, thoughts about that as a woman prime more strongly your comfort level and things like that day to day,

[01:01:39] which I think  memoryBlue does not have that. So, but anyway, so I think it’s a bit of recruiting. It’s women are intact like crazy. So, and it’s just going to get higher numbers wise, but yeah, I’d say like looking at people that have been successful here and successful in the past and panning out to like their network is just a great way to do [01:02:00] things.

[01:02:00] That’s what I would recommend more than anything. Like I could give you a bunch of people that I’d be like, “Yeah, you should take 

[01:02:04] her.” Like, if they were in Northern Virginia, you know, or whatever, but but yeah. I feel like I can’t answer it too. 

[01:02:12] Marc Gonyea: [01:02:12] Well, you know, it’s a hard question for me.

[01:02:14] It’s a bit unfair for me to ask you, but I want to ask because I wonder if you ever think about it. 

[01:02:18] ‘Cause there are more men 

[01:02:19] in high tech sales than there are women and…

[01:02:21] Sadie Kneuper: [01:02:21] Yeah, let’s get to that. Let’s get to that. So, it’s truly like nothing I really ever think about, like, when I go to interview somewhere, I’m not like, “Oh, but I’m not a man.” Like that’s a blessing, I guess. Probably just like my mom and stuff. And like, my brother has never made me, like, I dunno, just the way I was raised,

[01:02:36] I guess. Doesn’t come across my mind. If anything, it’s 

[01:02:40] like, “Do I have enough 

[01:02:41] experience for this role?” But never man… 

[01:02:44] Chris Corcoran: [01:02:44] It goes back to your, your older brother picking you for football instead of your other brothers. 

[01:02:48] Sadie Kneuper: [01:02:48] For sure. 

[01:02:49] Chris Corcoran: [01:02:49] He’s like, “I’m taking the best player available. I don’t care if it’s my brother or my 

[01:02:52] sister.”

[01:02:53] Sadie Kneuper: [01:02:53] That’s 

[01:02:54] so cute. It’s like he graded me. Yeah, accurate. I’m like pretty confident, like, like I said, I’m [01:03:00] quiet when I start a role or whatever. It may come across, like as lack of confidence, but I’m trying to observe. I’m actually like really afraid when I don’t know one person. Just need to know one 

[01:03:09] person. But anyway, so I never really think about 

[01:03:12] it like me, myself personally, but I am aware of what goes on in the world and 

[01:03:16] what goes on in my day to day. That will tie into like, looking for a job, like the way you conduct yourself, all of those things. 

[01:03:23] But in terms of a job, like, we should be very much compared to like, who gets it done and like, yes,

[01:03:28] who has certain level of experience when they’re coming in, but irrelevant otherwise. I think women can also, I love the pitch, like women are more like emotionally intelligent, so like they’re better at sales. Like there’s a lot of aspects to sales that wasn’t even me being mean, but like, men are better because they’re more direct. Like we’re all over the place 

[01:03:48] in terms of personality.

[01:03:50] Like the gender roles are hilarious. But anyway, so I think like when you think about somebody who just like gets it done, like they don’t have to even come from like 

[01:03:57] sales. You can like just get their [01:04:00] vibe, confidence or something. But yeah, I think for me personally, I run a team with all boys, 

[01:04:05] right now, all the AUA ones been that way 

[01:04:08] for, you know, a lot of times. Sometimes a girl comes in.

[01:04:11] Yeah, I like to run 

[01:04:12] that shit. No, I’m just kidding. But I don’t know. I,…

[01:04:20] Marc Gonyea: [01:04:20] That was good. No, there’s no, right, there’s no final answer. Like this is how it’s gonna solve 

[01:04:23] that. I just want to get your take on it. 

[01:04:25] Sadie Kneuper: [01:04:25] Yeah, I think it’s important be aware of 

[01:04:27] everything, like for sure. And I’m glad that I feel this way, because a lot of like women don’t. 

[01:04:32] And to be aware of that also, like that’s, yeah, that’s something to, you know, they hopefully they have good like bosses, like you guys and people who will like make them feel like that way.

[01:04:43] And then their confidence comes through because if you feel that way your 

[01:04:47] confidence will remain for the role. Like that’s really important too. You don’t feel comfy. So yeah.

[01:04:52] Marc Gonyea: [01:04:52] All 

[01:04:52] right. Cool. Sadie, that has been 

[01:04:55] awesome.

[01:04:56] Chris Corcoran: [01:04:56] Very good, Sadie. Some, some wisdom. 

[01:04:59] Sadie Kneuper: [01:04:59] That’s cool.

[01:05:02] [01:05:00] Marc Gonyea: [01:05:02] I think you were, I think you were great. It was very entertaining, but you dropped some nuggets there too. Very and people were listening closely, they’re going to get a lot of 

[01:05:09] good insight.

[01:05:11] Sadie Kneuper: [01:05:11] That’s good. I want to, I should 

[01:05:13] come back.

[01:05:14] Chris Corcoran: [01:05:14] You should.

[01:05:16] Sadie Kneuper: [01:05:16] You guys are so successful, I want to go to that Seattle office. Is that what it is? Oh my God. 

[01:05:21] Marc Gonyea: [01:05:21] You let us know whenever, I will host you and you can lecture to the, to 

[01:05:25] the, to the SDRs. We have 220 SDRs. 

[01:05:30] Sadie Kneuper: [01:05:30] Across all? 

[01:05:31] Marc Gonyea: [01:05:31] Across all locations. 

[01:05:32] Yeah. So…

[01:05:34] Sadie Kneuper: [01:05:34] Is Boone still popping or do you guys still up…?

[01:05:37] Marc Gonyea: [01:05:37] Hopefully though. Boone, 

[01:05:38] I think Boone will eventually

[01:05:39] become a parking lot. 

[01:05:40] Chris Corcoran: [01:05:40] Sadie, Boone Boone was condemned. 

[01:05:43] Sadie Kneuper: [01:05:43] Boone was like. “You got to put that on fire.” That was wild.

[01:05:49] Marc Gonyea: [01:05:49] It was wild. 

[01:05:49] Chris Corcoran: [01:05:49] Let’s just say, let’s just 

[01:05:50] say we got our money’s worth. 

[01:05:52] Sadie Kneuper: [01:05:52] Yeah. That was Mishler’s testosterone of an office, right, for what’s California? [01:06:00] And it was like, “Dude, they’re playing Nintendo, drinking beer on a Thursday.” It’s like, “They hit quota.” 

[01:06:06] Marc Gonyea: [01:06:06] That’s right. There you go. Mishler style, man. Look, you were in Mishler’s team, right, from 

[01:06:11] the jump?

[01:06:11] Sadie Kneuper: [01:06:11] Lee first for like just the,… I want to say. I went to Michler prety  fast though. 

[01:06:15] Marc Gonyea: [01:06:15] Yeah. Oh, there’s a Mishler Okey-Doke. Mishler like Branson scam, where he somehow all legitimate, somehow he got all these top performers from other people’s teams to join his team and made it twice as powerful. I don’t know, at the, Lee Lee Ryan’s who who’s, who’s awesome to know, Lee was great, but somehow I’m… Chris,

[01:06:34] right? Chris, remember this? Like, so, so, and you were like, it was like the Herschel Walker train. For those who know, those listening you said you didn’t know what that is your brothers might know, maybe actually now that I’m older than you. So like anyways, it was a, it was a queued at Todd. Let’s put it that way.

[01:06:49] When you ended up at 

[01:06:50] Mishler’s team.

[01:06:52] Sadie Kneuper: [01:06:52] Yeah, he was doing that. You’re right. He had a squad. Yeah.

[01:06:55] Marc Gonyea: [01:06:55] He had a squad. Legendary. Okay. Sadie, thank you very much. 

[01:06:59] Chris Corcoran: [01:06:59] Very [01:07:00] good. Hopefully, hopefully we’ll see it in the flesh down in Tysons. 

[01:07:03] Sadie Kneuper: [01:07:03] Yeah, yeah. Tyson’s corner. Yeah. All right. Well, it was great catching up guys. I, yeah… do you want to, if I come back, I’ll stop by the office. I’ll reach out to you. 

[01:07:12] Marc Gonyea: [01:07:12] Please do. 

[01:07:15]