Hire and ramp your first rep

Stop being the only person who can sell it, without setting fire to a year of runway.

4 steps, 16 questions underneath, read for doing the work

1. 1
   Hiring and ramping GTM people

   Your first sales hire, the interview loop, the ramp plan, and knowing early when someone is not going to make it.

   What should a new rep's first 90 days actually look like? 5 → I am the first AE and my founder still runs half the deals. How do we split it? 3 → How do I know whether a new rep is going to work out before six months have gone by? 4 → How do I hire SDRs in India and keep them past four months? 5 →
2. 2
   Comp, quotas and territory

   Comp plans, quotas, OTE and accelerators, territory and segment design, in dollars and in rupees.

   How do I set quotas that most of the team can actually hit? 5 → How should SDR, AE and customer success comp actually differ, and why? 4 → Do SPIFFs work, or do they just teach the team to wait for the next one? 4 → How do I split territories and segments without starting a civil war? 5 →
3. 3
   Running a sales process and closing

   Discovery, demos, qualification, champions, procurement and the last mile to a signature.

   How do I know if a deal is real or if I am being strung along? 4 → My demos go well and then the deal stalls. How do I stop that? 5 → They want a pilot before they commit. How do I run one that ends in a contract instead of a shrug? 4 → Procurement has entered the conversation and wants thirty percent off. How do I negotiate without gutting the deal? 4 →
4. 4
   Forecasting and GTM metrics

   Pipeline coverage, stage conversion, CAC payback, magic number, and calling a number you can defend to a board.

   How do I calculate conversion rates by stage, and what do I actually do once I have them? 4 → How do I forecast my own quarter as an AE so my manager stops overriding my number? 4 → Our win rate dropped this quarter. How do I work out why rather than just guessing? 4 → How do I tell whether my pipeline is real or just hopeful? 4 →