#272 Audience Questions – Get Comfortable being Uncomfortable and Differentiating Oneself

Notes:

How can sales engineers differentiate themselves inside and outside their teams? Could AI replace some of the work that sales engineers do? Is sales really easier than presales?

In this week’s podcast episode, I brought a co-host, a friend, and a previous guest, Tony Moze, to do a live QA with listeners, where we fielded and answered the three questions above.

We dove deep into each question, probed the thinking behind each, and offered our best answers based on years of experience working in this field.

If any of these interests you, then this episode would be fun.

Key Takeaways:

How SEs can make a lasting impression in internal meetings
The qualities of a good SE
Why listening is an important part of communication
How to differentiate yourself by asking the right questions
How to lead meetings
How to differentiate yourself as an SE by developing great relationships with your customers
Looking at the sales team like a basketball team
How to make a discovery when you are uncertain about a certain technology
Why leveraging other people effectively is an important skill for SEs
Demystifying the complaint that presales do the work and sales make all the money
The importance of shadowing people
How AI affects sales engineering

Quotes:

People think communication is all about the active activity of it, things that are coming outside, but then also, what about the receptivity of it? — Tony Moze

SEs think their job is to solve problems. But the harder part about solving the problem is to convince the customer that we have the best solution. — Ramzi Marjaba

If you’re in a meeting with your team, there’s a purpose behind the meeting. What is that purpose? Try to ask the right questions during that call. — Ramzi Marjaba

Be an asset to the account manager. As in, don’t be a resource. Don’t be someone who just does what they’re told. Be a partner. If an account manager is saying you should do this and you think it’s a bad idea, help them understand why it’s a bad idea. What else can you do instead to get the same result that they’re looking for? — Ramzi Marjaba

Proof of concepts is where deals go to die. It’s a black hole of death if it’s not managed properly. So if you can manage a proof of concept or proof of value properly, you’re differentiating yourself. — Ramzi Marjaba

It’s much easier to understand the problem than to understand the technology. — Ramzi Marjaba

The most important part of an SEs job is not necessarily to know the answers right there on the spot, but it’s to know how to get the answers to the customers in a timely fashion. — Ramzi Marjaba

You need to know how to ask for help. You need to know how to convince people to help you as well. And sometimes that means you have to have helped them in the past, or you’re willing to help them in the future, or there’s something in it for them to help you right now. — Ramzi Marjaba

Sales is not an easy job. It’s not even. There are some fun aspects to it. But it’s a high-stress, high-reward job. Sales engineering is not. I mean, yes, it’s long hours. Yes, there’s the stress of performing a demo. But it’s also fun to perform the demo. It’s fun to work on these things. We get to sit back; we get to say I need to learn technology. So I’m going to spend four hours today learning AWS. A salesperson does not have that luxury. If they’re not meeting a customer, they’re not doing their job. — Ramzi Marjaba

If the SE doesn’t hit their quota, it’s the salesperson’s job. If the salesperson doesn’t hit their quota, they’re gone. — Ramzi Marjaba

Instead of thinking of how to differentiate yourself, think about how you can serve others. That generally speaking, differentiate yourself, differentiates you from others. — Ramzi Marjaba