The best sales people understand the psychology of sales… and the best sales leaders understand the psychology of leading a successful GTM organization. Tomer Chernia, SVP Sales at Vercel has mastered both.
In this episode, he takes us through his sales and leadership strategy, which scaled Vercel to $100M ARR at breakneck speed.
The key to sales outreach that unlocks every buyer profile and market segment
Vercel’s unique mock pitch process uncovers what hiring managers really want to see
Episode Content:00:00 - Introducing Tomer Chernia, SVP Sales @ Vercel04:00 - From Selling MarTech to Open Source DevTools07:04 - Selling and Outreach to the Open Source Community13:42 - Splitting up Territories and Deal Complexity19:13 - Profile of Salesperson that succeed in Mid-market and Enterprise22:25 - Sales Hiring in Hypergrowth27:54 - Remote vs In-person Culture and Performance40:05 - Investing in the Success of the Sales Team44:36 - How to think about quotas and compensation48:59 - Balanced and Thoughtful Growth Plans54:17 - Lightning Round: Sales as a Super Power, Controversial Advice, Best Fictional Sales Person
You’ve heard how great Revenue Leaders hyper-scaled in the past few years. But, what does it take to do it now - at this moment in the market?
In the last 14 months, Jonathan Blackburn, VP of Sales turned a 6 person sales team with no scalable process into 40+ reps and is on his way to making Nooks the fastest growing startup of 2025.
For everyone currently on their own rocketship and looking for contemporary wisdom, find out what Nooks is doing right now to hyper-scale:
Going against all good Sales advice and winning 72% of the deals that offer the controversial FREE trial! *gasp
Reversing the industry norm of pushing up market to instead be pulled up market by strategic processes that build trust
Capitalizing on their exceptional timing in the market by doubling down on outbound pipeline generation with the best SDR team in the game
“Hyper-scale or die” is the battle cry for SaaS in 2025 and Nooks is set to win. Their VP of Sales, Jonathan Blackburn shares all the details of exactly how they’re doing it right now with Bravado CEO Sahil Mansuri.
Episode Content:
00:00 - Introducing Jonathan Blackburn, VP of Sales @ Nooks03:21 - Expanding the sales team and a 60 day internal evaluation08:51 - Try before you buy20:32 - Profile of rep to hire at Nooks30:20 - Red Flags while hiring35:32 - Setting up the team for success47:07 - Managing up as a VP of Sales54:03 - Pipeline and the resurgence of the SDR01:01:54 - Sales as a Superpower01:05:13 - Best advice early in your careerAre you Hiring Salespeople? Check out Bravado Talent - https://talent.bravado.co/
Vanta CRO Stevie Case hyper-scaled her team from 20 people and $10M to 300+ and $100M in less than two years. This week’s episode is a masterclass in how to change the trajectory of your business.
If your company is between $5M - $20M ARR, you’ll hear the cheat codes to
Moving Upmarket: How to scale to enterprise customers without losing focus on your core SMB base
Culture Building: Going all-in on enablement so your reps can grow their career as far as they want without leaving the company
Remote-First Structuring: How Vanta went against the conventional wisdom and achieved this hyper-growth with a fully remote sales team.
The bar for startup growth keeps getting raised. The only way to keep up is to lead the way. Bravado CEO Sahil Mansuri brings you the insights to help you do just that every other Wednesday on The Bravado Pod.
Are you Hiring Salespeople? Check out Bravado Talent - https://talent.bravado.co/
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/wearebravado
Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/bravado
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bravado_sales/https://
Bravado.co
Scaling SMB Vertical SaaS Owner.com from $2M to $30M with an Ever Evolving Playbook that Adapts Sales Strategy at Each Milestone: CRO Kyle Norton
The secret to the best Sales Playbook for scaling is that it constantly changes at each step. Kyle Norton took his company from $2M to $30M ARR in just a few years by pivoting the GTM strategy to the challenge at hand. Kyle offers actionable advice for Sales Leaders and Founders in early stages on:
- The people to hire in the beginning vs the people to hire to scale
- Indicators that determine if a $2M company has the potential to reach $30M
- How early investments in RevOps can help you scale faster
- Preparing for setbacks before they happen
You’ll hear everything a Founder needs to know about finding the right Sales Leader to take their startup to the first $30M, and everything that Sales Leader needs to know about getting there from Kyle Norton and Bravado CEO Sahil Mansuri in this episode.
Episode Content: 00:00 - Welcome Kyle Norton, CRO at Owner.com 03:20 - Doing hard things helped me be better at Sales 05:07 - Finding a winning company 16:43 - What to look for in a founding team 33:43 - Your first VP of Sales is a bridge 48:44 - You need Pirates and Romantics 58:010 - In office vs remote 1:08:35 - Shoot above your number 1:13:08 - Quick fire round
From Scaling GTM at Okta, Checkr, and Miro to How AI is Disrupting the SaaS Sales Playbook: CRO Sangeeta Chakraborty
Discover how the AI era is transforming Sales teams, Sales Leadership, and even CS. Drawing from her experience scaling revenue at top SaaS companies during major market disruptions, Sangeeta reveals:
Why traditional SaaS Sales strategies are being upended by AI-driven pricing and customer expectation changes
Battle-tested tactics for breaking into new markets without brand recognition
The most important skills for reps to thrive in the AI era
Strategies for Sales Leaders to meet today’s aggressive revenue targets
Bravado CEO, Sahil Mansuri asks the questions Founders, Sales VPs, and AEs need answered to crush quota in 2025.
Sangeeta's LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/sangeetachakraborty/
Episode Content: 00:00 - Welcoming Sangeeta Chakraborty to the Podcast! 06:41 - The importance of hiring the right people for Sales 12:12 - The evolution of post-sales in usage based pricing models 15:00 - The new AE role 22:20 - Building a culture of learning 28:34 - Winners don’t shy away from big targets 37:05 - Outlier performance will always lead Sales 38:42 - The right way to plan for outliers 42:28 - TOFU for startups 47:17 - The next phase of brand growth 49:05 - The work most companies try to skip 52:02 - Quick fire round
Are you Hiring Salespeople? Check out Bravado Talent - https://talent.bravado.co/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/wearebravado Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/bravado Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bravado_sales/ https://Bravado.co