As Y-axis, a new-age immigration and travel services company  goes on to its 8th year of using salesforce.com, there are many lessons learnt and worth sharing on how salesforce added to its success. Here we interviewed Xavier Augustin, CEO of Y-Axis.com to share some of his insights on user adoption journey as one of the early adopters of salesforce in India.

With 150 users transitioning from using outdated systems to Salesforce almost instantly, User Adoption of Salesforce.com (and for that matter any CRM or software) was a challenge to deal with head on. Led by Xavier, his capable team put together industry knowledge, deep understanding of its employee behaviour and visionary thinking to achieve 99% salesforce adoption within the 1st month of usage.

And this is the story they continue to polish with same results as Y-Axis grows  to 600 over users on salesforce.com. Following lessons can be applied to most businesses and scenarios to drive similar results.

Rule #1 – Go for 100% MakeOver

“Everyone, Every time, Everything!”

From the very beginning, Y-Axis team decided to put all their chips in one basket. Backed by their gut, they believed that everyone must speak a common ‘technology language’ at work. So instead of going with cautious (or even skeptical) approach, it was decided all employee, all departments and all processes will be migrated to a powerful workflow based CRM like Salesforce.

Quoting an example of a Swedish city that witnessed chaos when it made a switchover from left to the right side driving, Xavier claims half-hearted decisions cost a lot more than trusting gut and going big.

Rule #2 – Maintain continuity

“From Start to Finish”

Y-Axis uses salesforce.com from the front office (receptionist) to the delivery team who dispatches papers and records transactions on salesforce. There are no disconnects in the process from “start to finish” and any activity trail or responsibility does not leave salesforce.com.

It was a core, well-deliberated decision to move entire thread of transaction from initial customer contact to last on salesforce.com, even though it meant adding a non-sales user on CRM software. That removed the scope of information missing out in translation from Salesforce to other systems and back.

“We can track each activity, sales or internal audit related, in the value chain on salesforce, with ease”

Rule #3 – One Database – One Truth

“All eggs in one basket”

The decisions leading to above 2 lessons also meant another pivotal decision to have all vital data – current & historical in one central location, that is on salesforce.com. The team had a foresight that not doing so will cause its users to desperately search data in different systems and hence affect productivity.

“Making sure there is one central source of truth (for data) that you trust, it is the single most important  productivity hack”

Rule #4 – Badge In or Log in

“Be present on Salesforce”

Logging into salesforce.com one simple activity that defined being present or absent from work. Working with demanding customer deadlines, Y-Axis depends on minimum hourly productivity to produce results. The team benefited from the ability to track log-in times on salesforce to ensure attendance and punctuality. And hence, tackle productivity from one dimension.

Since Salesforce had to be defined as a core functional system for results, employees were required to log in no later than 15 minutes from entry into the office. The expectation was clearly set. The performance is measured on weekly reports and dashboards. And defaulters and incongruent behaviors are dealt with in performance meetings.

Though Y-Axis team used a ‘stick’ method by imposing fines for the late entry, having clearly set expectations ensured that after a week of such system there were no fines imposed.

Rule #5 – Login & Activity

“Pugmarks of customer oriented service”

Ensuring login punctuality was is one part of the equation. Ensuring right behaviors and value attached to the behavior being measured on salesforce is the other. For this, all users of Y-Axis were given a clear set of responsibilities, corresponding activities and its impact on Salesforce system usage.

The implementation team ensured all go-to systems for daily activities were connected. In this case, Outlook, salesforce.com and calling systems. It was easy to log activities, and even easier to get trained. This was supplemented by an implementation team member assuming the responsibility for maintaining an audit check on the activity report on daily basis.

Rule #6 – Carrot & Stick

“What a fine system”?

Making salesforce.com as a system that is indispensable, easy and effective took the majority of the time when implementation team met together. Incenting people to use it was one way to ensure adoption was high. That was the carrot. However, you can always expect some rebels.

“And when the system is fool proof, nobody messes with it. Since violation is easily traced, penalties can be levied.”

Y-Axis recommends a combination of daily audits, penalties to ensure defaulters use the system.
To manage a team of 600 people on core customer management system could take a full-time employee to do so. And its importance cannot be overplayed.

Of course, all this is made easy with advanced reporting by Salesforce’s user adoption reporting analytics.

Rule #7 – The Scoreboard & Buzz

“Keep the score!”

“What’s a game without a scoreboard?” I mean you could watch the exciting game of soccer all day long but what’s the fun without a scoreboard. Perhaps if there were no scoreboard, teams won’t be as motivated to play. And no wonder, all professional sports networks spend tonnes of money making their scoreboards look jazzy and appealing.

Similarly, at Y-Axis the team uses dashboards to create the much-needed buzz for business and internal motivation. The principles for “jazziness” are simple – transparency, relevance, urgency.

All employees track commissions transparently on Salesforce. And these commissions, without any surprise, are tied to activities also measured on Salesforce. All commissions earned by employees for the month, week or even day are visible on the real-time basis and serve as a good motivator.

“To make the dashboard tick in your favor, you have to use salesforce”.

Rule #8 – Let it sell itself

“Proof is in the Pudding”

Again, with ease of use, effectiveness and relevance as the focus, the Salesforce implementation team won the major battle. The Carrot and the Stick tactic was the other one. However, once the early adopters see that benefits of Salesforce help them execute better, they become your partners in spreading best usage practices in their teams.

The teams were divided into 3 major user groups- Sales, Process and Case managers. Each team leaders were convinced of benefits of using Salesforce effectively. These translated to either saving time in doing tasks that were mundane or being faster in achieving their goals. Once they got it, their team members followed their footsteps.

Rule #9 – Salesforce Democracy drives real change

“By the users, for the users and from the users.“

Salesforce implementation and training program involved managers at all levels to participate, contribute, execute and monitor performance on Salesforce.com. It was not just the top management pulling strings.

Empowerment of the middle managers in the roll-out process gave them the incentive to collect feedback from all users to make the system work for them. As a result, the software is more tailored to our business needs.

Users built it, they understand it and hence they adopt it!

Rule #10 – Management Reporting

“The world in my oyster”

As someone building a legacy of Y-Axis, Xavier (and his partner) were the only caretakers of Y-Axis uniqueness, its processes and security. They understood that with Salesforce.com, the business got more defined, protected and secured from any mishaps.

In order to run a business that is expanding at a stellar rate, it would be impossible to function without a management dashboard, the one that gives tell-tale signs on what is working and what is not. The management team at Y-Axis is the biggest believer of salesforce and hence can drive decisions to make it more effective at grass-root level by looking at its dashboards.

These 10 golden rules for user adoption are tool independent and behavior driven. These could be applied to any software or any system changes that necessitate deliberating over user adoption challenges as part of a success plan. Within Salesforce world, since Y-Axis started using it  there have been remarkable additions to user-adoption stories. Having an effective training plan using tools like Walk-me certainly go a long way to ensuring the best adoption tactics.

However, the success of user adoption program for any IT system is based on deeply understanding user behavior, and especially that of your own employees.

From coaching sales reps to being approachable, sales managers have lots on their plate and they have to manage it all with perfection. Similarly, reps have their sole aspirations and expectations from their bosses to keep up with too! But what is it that each of them expect from the other? How can they really meet each other midway to work efficiently?

What sales managers think reps want

A sales manager, in particular, think (and must think) a step ahead in the profession since he or she is the key driver of success of an organization. Without a sales manager, one can’t expect a strong sales management team and  coaching sales reps is definitely a part of the process.
But sales managers having reached a certain benchmark in their careers, aren’t really able to gauge what exactly their sales team members expect from them. Here’s what a typical manager thinks his reps expect him to be for working effectively as a team:

1. Confidence: Selling is a game and it is all about numbers. If at the end of the day, reps don’t make numbers, they are scrutinised for not doing enough. To make work easier for them, it is necessary for the sales manager to exude ‘confidence’ in meeting and even exceeding the targets set by the organization.  He or she needs to show reps that the demands of this profession, though taxing, are natural and well paying so that they give it their best shot.
2. Communication: A sales manager feels it is important for him or her to ‘talk’ to the team on a regular basis. Whether it is regarding fixing new goals, dealing with petty issues or changing sales tactics, he needs to pump them up to perform.
3. Time Management: Meeting targets well in time is a daunting task for many. Sales reps are responsible for making timely submissions, which more often than not, doesn’t happen. From generating leads to pursuing them and closing deals, time management plays a crucial part. Sales managers, with years of experience under their belt, are able to manage their time perfectly – and they think that’s all the sales reps need to see to get inspired.
4. Organization: The sales reps may have their targets in place but if they don’t know how to meet them so as to suffice the organization’s end goals, what’s the point? And that’s exactly why a sales manager thinks he needs to model ‘organization’ while working with or in front of his reps.

But there are two sides to every coin.

What sales reps really want

Just like the sales manager, even the reps have their own sets of preferences and of course, assumptions. While a sales manager may take relevant decisions on the basis of circumstances and observations, sales reps think (and function) on a different tangent.

Here’s what they are actually seeking for from the managers:

1. Coaching: Reps understand and value the importance of honing their skills to not only make great sales and do good work but also push their career in a particular direction. While they believe their hard work will fetch them promotion, they understand it is not an easy job. They expect their managers to impart industry knowledge and coach them to be an effective team player.
2. Strategy: The sales model is ever-evolving to cater to the changing trends, which is why it is important to have a strategy in place beforehand. Sales reps expect the manager to have done his bit of research on current trends, business metrics and laid down a blueprint of how to reach the end goal. While improvising on the go is unavoidable, the reps seek for at least a direction to begin working in.
3. Leadership: Reps like a clear perspective on things at work every once a while, everyone does. Whether it is regarding strategizing a policy or closing a deal—reps expect their sales manager to act as a support system and offer insights on dealing with the challenges in the sales business. In case of a deal-gone-raw, they expect the manager to pull them out of it or make it right. They want to be led by an example and who is better than the sales manager to guide them with experience?
4. Feedback: Although it is necessary for the sales manager to instill a strong team spirit, sometimes conducting an individual analysis per rep is also important. Needless to say, reps would appreciate having someone senior to can rely on for advice or feedback, whenever necessary. A positive feedback will help them stay motivated and a negative feedback will put things in perspective and make them work towards it.
5. Engagement: Involvement of seniors is a necessity in any field. Professional selling also requires the same. Any rep, at any time, would and does appreciate an engaging manager. Someone who doesn’t just dictate a strategy, but also sits down with the team to discuss more ideas to improvise on it.
6. Structure: A structured way of working ensures success in any organization.  Sales reps expect their sales manager to set up a basic structure or hierarchy at work. It not only highlights the roles and responsibilities of each employee but also ensures smoother and faster communication.

Both sales managers and reps have to work together to gain maximum results. Therefore, it is important to be well coordinated and understand each other’s expectations. There is a reason why the entire setup is called a sales ‘team’.

Equal efforts, minimum risks and maximum outputs.

I was recently speaking with the head of sales at a hyper growth startup in robotics. He left Google’s top sales leadership position to put this startup on a sales growth trajectory. Six months back when he joined, they had 3 sales reps, no defined sales process, $200K in revenue and a growth mandate of 200% ARR increase. As he got on the phone, he complained – “I should have never joined a startup. Things never get simpler!”

That’s right.

The school of corporate sales teaches its leaders many lessons but nothing prepares you enough for the chaotic world of startup sales. What does it take to write a sales playbook for 200% growth plan without empirical data to support targeting & selling strategies that work ?

What does it take to succeed as a CSO in a startup?

We decided to summarize the best practices we’ve discovered over the years working with startups and share our insights on what does it take to be a CSO superstar in a startup.

1. Keep It Simple

Startups are agile. And it’s a double edged sword. As a newly anointed revenue leader of the clan, you might be tempted to tackle growth objectives in multiple directions. Trying to handle too many things creates complexity. Lack of historical data on what strategy works and what does not is like sailing without a compass.

As the chief scientist of sales world at a startup, how would you proceed?

First, limit all the moving parts and variables to the absolute minimum. Focus on 1-2 sales (scientific) objectives per quarter. For example: If its testing outbound messaging, get focused on testing subject lines with emails for 1 month to see open rate results rather than replies. Next month focus on driving greater replies with tested subject lines.

2. Hire Slow & Fire Fast

There is one thing you cannot change as easily as you go along is your sales culture. You and your first hire will set the sales culture. And defining your core values before ‘handpicking’ your first sales hire is the key.

We love how SalesLoft (poster boy of startup world) hires its sales executives based on core values of “self starting, supportive and positive“. While hiring topic commands a separate post, I can only do justice to this sub-section by saying take any guesses out of hiring the right candidate. Use as simple profile tests as DISC to identify candidates most likely to succeed (or atlas weed out unwanted ones early on).

I wrote a short DISC article on selecting Sales Development Reps.

3. Engage In Every Part of  Your Business

While laser focus is key to success experimentation in your role as a CSO, it should be exactly the opposite when it comes to knowing your business. Get involved with operations, product development, digital marketing and close cousin – business development. As CSO, you are looked upon as the chief evangelist of your company. The power to convince and convert will only come from knowing your product, business and industry better.

4. Cashflow is The King

This means that a small department of 1000 people company using your product for free is worth less than 50 people startup buying your product at a value. No matter where your experimentation focus lies, if getting that cash-cow home is not your singular focus with every sales pitch, you better take a notice before things turn sour.

5. Assign Clear Roles & Responsibilities

Handling multiple responsibilities as a CSO takes “Accountability” as the first victim. To put more specifically, accountability to sales forecast. A CSO must do two things – for himself as well as for his team members (including his CEO if engaged in sales activities).

First, a clear division of responsibility across a full spectrum of sales process. As Aaron Ross’ Predictable Revenue model recommends, differentiating between an inbound sales function, versus an outbound prospecting, versus active selling (from detailed discovery to closure), versus a farmer (responsible for driving greater penetration in existing account).

Second, define clear metrics for those responsibility areas (and highly recommended to tie revenue numbers as goals against those metrics). This way, none of your team members should get away by giving ‘sales activity’ as an excuse for driving non-revenue generating activities (especially your CEO )

6. Drive Crystal Clear Visibility

Your investors and board members have trusted you. They have put their money in your hands and hence it is your responsibility to provide visibility and transparency. On the other side, your weekly leadership calls require any subjectivity to be left behind in dealing with sales numbers.

So have you heard about sweet little thing called CRM. And which is NOT an excel sheet? Focus on driving visibility for all members of the startup game through CRM. You should be the care-tacker, facilitator, policeman of this must-have tool. If you don’t understand reporting on your CRM of choice, you will never command respect of your players.

find out more about crm

7. Short Term Goals

Have short term measurable goals, move one step at a time. Keep an eye on your ARR of 1 million but celebrate success of securing ARR of $5000 with same joy and pride. Take corrective actions quick and fast and never follow a strict path, be ready for a change in plan and pivot accordingly.

8. Get Moved By Data

A CSO (as we like to call you, the Chief Sales Scientist) is driven by data, even though there are no data points to begin with for a startup. Create plans and set directions for sales that will enable data based decisions, if not now, 6 months in the future. Data points can be applied to decisions on types of industries you target, quality of people you hire and retain, buyers who are likely to buy, or even prospects who are likely to reply to your cold email.

Mark Roberge, an engineer by qualification, found himself setting up sales for (once a startup) Hubspot. Befitting of an analytical engineer’s mind, he details the data driven formula for hiring, training & sales management in his book – Sales Acceleration Formula.

9. Stay a Happy Team

Reward excellence and performance. Challenge comfort zones and celebrate success together with meaningful experiences (because money only moves us once a month, whereas experiences – every day!) Make sure the employees are recognized. Have regular team meetings; outings and come together to celebrate. Spice up things with unconventional team motivation mindset. Take a look at how BlueBoard puts unique incentives as forefront of team motivation.

10. Engage. Engage. Engage! Especially with Your Customers.

There is nothing better that can happen to sales lifeline than engaging in mindful, deepest and vulnerable conversations with customers. The worst thing will happen is ‘much needed’ feedback to be better as a salesperson and the best, a referral.

We believe these 10 rules will help you navigate through the mess in the chaotic sales roadmap at your startup. What are you specifically struggling with as the Chief Sales Scientist? Give us a SHOUT  OUT, and we can figure it out together.