We The Sales Engineers: A Resource For Sales Engineers, By Sales Engineers

Skills needed for SEs are much different than those in larger organizations, potentially. Also, different products being sold to IT could require different skills. We discuss these topics with our guests.   shownotes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show184

Joel Duffield is the Lead Solutions Consultant at Vidyard and has been a listener of We the Sales Engineers podcast since its humble beginnings in 2018. Now he is an SE Lead! We talk about his journey Shownotes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show183

Salespeople usually have more visibility in their organizations. When a CEO or CTO wants to give kudos to a Sales team, they usually mention the Salesperson's name, and if they want to be more inclusive, they would say "and team". I have always been curious about this, so we decided to talk to a COO to see what his view is about Sales Engineering Full show: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show182

Being a founder-based seller can be tough. For one, you’ve got to wear multiple hats, and two, it becomes harder to take track of all the things you’re running. What we see most founders struggle in is handing that baton to sales roles, especially presales. In today’s episode, we talk to Joseph Fung on why that is so, what founders can do to get out of that sales role fast, and how sales engineers can make many founders and company owners’ lives so much easier and better. show notes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show181

The Sales Engineering role has been through several revolutions. We have moved from being a technical resource to demo jockeys, to value sellers and now we are moving into the social world. That is what we discuss with our guest.   Shownotes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show180

Many people I work with expect promotions or expect opportunities to just land in their lap. Throughout my career, I've noticed that the people who have opportunities simply fall in their lap, they have been preparing for them for years. This is what this show is all about. How our guest, Andy Ryan, started learning about a new industry before there was even a role in that industry. When a role opened, it fell in his lap. The question is, would it have fallen in his lap if he had not learned about it and prepared for it?   Full show notes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show179

What would you do as a manager of 22 solutions consultants in your department? How would you handle their many pressing concerns and build relationships and at the same time give feedback for each person on your team? This episode pretty much sums up what we would do if we could change the role of presales within an organization. Also, Tony shares how he was able to move the role of presales from a subservient role under the sales division into more or a partnership and beyond. shownotes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show178

We are not perfect. Mistakes can be made. Some small ones that we can just brush off, others that are big. Big enough that causes someone to lose on a guaranteed job. We talk to Vaibhav Malik who although he did everything right, one mistake caused him the job. Luckily he learned from it and found another job that he is excited about. Check out the full show notes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show177

Akshat Srivastava is one of the co-founders of SE Nation and a friend of the show. We discuss his blog post about interviewing the interviewer during a job search, to make sure we are a good fit.

As a beginner SE, it can be quite difficult and overwhelming not knowing where to start. Do I study technical first, or do I train in sales and speaking with customers? In this podcast, my guest and I discuss the five different phases of sales engineering, how my guest, Samuel West got started as an SE and what he’s learned being a solo sales engineer at the company he works with. We also go into how to scale as a solo SE and how we can help close more deals at the end of a quarter. Samuel Joseph West has been a technical sales engineer for the past five years specializing in cybersecurity software. He also works with the SE community to try and help bring more people into the role of SE and try to keep developing that role. Shownotes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show175

What differentiates someone as a good leader? This can happen before the person is even promoted to a leadership role. Today we talk to Sonu and see his story and he became the reluctant SE Manager.   Show notes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show174

Thinking about giving presales a shot? If you are considering switching careers and wondering about the potential room for growth or longevity you could have in this role, then this episode is for you. Today, we chat with Supriya Yerramilli as she shares how she decided to become a sales engineer and her journey preparing and getting herself into that role.  Suriya Yerramilli changed careers from public accounting to working successfully in the tech space. Her previous experience working as a product specialist, full-stack developer, instructor at General Assembly in coding programs such as Python Programming, Front-End Web Development, and Software Engineering Immersive has led her to her dream role as a sales engineer. Shownotes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show173 

A major aspect of Sales Engineering is performing a demo. Some managers have time to go through their SEs demos, but most of the Sales Engineer Managers have other urgent issues that need their attention. That’s where Kerry comes in. He has reviewed countless demos and coached so many SEs, and today we will talk about what he looks for in a demo and how we can improve it.   Shownotes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show172

Over the course of my career as a Sales Engineer, and while interviewing other SEs on the podcast or coaching and training some of them, I’ve found that our role just keeps on evolving. While we are required to have excellent technical knowledge product and sales skills, there’s a lot more to it than you think, that even new, aspiring, or even experienced SEs still get wrong to this day.  So, in today’s podcast, my co-host Binayak Kanungo and I explore the top five mental hurdles most Sales Engineers run into throughout their SE career and how to overcome them.   shownotes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show171

I often ask people who are new to sales engineering what their career plans are. Most of them answer to learn coding or public speaking, but rarely do they have a deeper reason or motivation behind learning them. It’s because most job descriptions for Sales Engineers list certain skills and qualifications such as multitasking and persuasion, but these skills are not as necessary as you think. That is why in this episode, I want to focus on the valuable skills that can help you become an indispensable SE and advance your SE career (without you even realizing it). We will examine situations where you can apply deep work and focus and show alternative skills you can learn to set yourself apart from other SEs. shownotes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show170

As a sales engineer, it’s not enough to have exceptional technical knowledge about the products. It also needs to have an in-depth understanding of the customers and how the product can help solve their pain points and challenges. One way to do that is to master handling objections. How do the SE and the sales rep go handle a sales conversation where the sales team and the prospects walk away happily in the sale? Is it possible to create a win-win situation for both parties involved despite the customers’ many objections?   That’s exactly what we’re talking about in today’s podcast with Amazon's #1 International best-selling author and America's #1 expert in revenue expansion and sales optimization, Doug Brown. He is the founder and CEO of Business Success Factors, a company offering business training, and Vibitno.com, the web-based company that accelerates sales, and has advised companies such as Intuit, CBS Television, Procter & Gamble, Enterprise Rent-A-Car, Nationwide, Embassy Suites, Inc., among many

Moving jobs is stressful enough, but moving as a VP of Sales Engineering, owning a continent, is a different kind of stress. We discuss that with Greg Holmes, how he managed the move and handled working with a new team.   full show notes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show168

Over my years of being a Sales Engineer, I’ve come to know and am still learning about new terms and roles that help in the organization. One of these roles is around enablement, sales enablement, or revenue enablement. Many are still uninformed about this role and often have it confused with marketing, channel sellers, or customer success managers. As you’ll learn in today’s episode, revenue enablement does not fall into any of these roles, but it’s orchestrating and collaborating across all these channels to have effective customer conversations as well as address the needs of all departments throughout an organization. We invited John Moore aka The Collaborator to shed more light on this topic. Show notes: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show167

In this podcast, Peter discusses his role and life at VMware Canada, how he empowers his team to maintain their mental health, and how he keeps his sanity working as a sales leader and technical director. full show: https://wethesalesengineers.com/show166

What is the right way to grow your Presales Organization. Many do it as an afterthought whereas our guest today has a process in place for it.