轉變時機的到來

????等到銷售發展到了中年，你作為CEO需要幫助銷售從開拓型向流程型轉變。我聽說有少數開拓型銷售人員可以基于早期拳打腳踢的銷售經驗，轉換到可規模化的清單式銷售流程。但我沒有親眼見過。很可能的狀況是，你作為CEO，將不得不選擇開拓型銷售人員，用他們的經驗制定出更可重復、可規模化的流程銷售法。而且，你可能必須雇傭一名新的銷售主管。【或許有人想知道尤金后來怎么樣了。就在我們準備轉向流程型銷售方式之前，谷歌（Google）收購了JotSpot。】

流程型銷售人員

????等到了這個階段，你可能已經擁有一款非常契合市場的產品。但你的銷售成本太高了，你的流程太亂，缺乏可預見性，而且銷售周期太長。總之，你需要一個不那么熱衷于思考新事物，但喜歡優化眼前流程的人。你需要一個真正喜歡打造銷售機器的人。

????流程型銷售人員喜歡重復性、可規模化的方法。他們熱愛效率。他們用詳細的衡量標準來追蹤團隊表現。他們建立軟件系統。他們追求可預見的增長。他們考慮建立團隊，通過管理大量團隊來實現目標。他們來自甲骨文（Oracle）、IBM或SAP這樣擁有高度流程型銷售文化的公司。

????那么，哪里會出問題？主要有兩種情況：

????1. 你在公司早期引入了一名流程型銷售人員。結果會很糟糕，常見不適癥有：這個人指望有現成的銷售“腳本”，指望你知道什么樣的人是目標銷售對象。工程師們總是很郁悶，因為銷售人員總是在說，如果產品能增加些什么功能，就能賣出去了（開拓型銷售人員是銷售現有、即便不完美產品的大師，不是銷售期望。）這種情況的結局往往都以銷售人員離職告終。

????2. 你在應該轉向流程型方式時，繼續長時間依賴開拓型銷售主管。典型的一個特征就是，CEO會感覺缺乏對公司前景的足夠把握和預見。當CEO提出典型客戶模式以及從銷售線索-銷售意向-銷售結果的時間表之類問題時，總是不能得到清晰的解答。CEO希望獲得銷售流程更全面的報告和預見性。要改變這種情況，應當引入一名新的銷售負責人，將原先的開拓型主管轉到（一個或兩個）特殊項目團隊，專門負責流程型人員不知如何銷售的新產品和新服務。

????因此，考慮銷售環節時，不妨想想這兩類銷售人員，確保在對的時間用對人。萬物有時節。每個階段有每個階段的銷售人員。

????喬?克勞斯是 Google Ventures的合伙人。1993年，他聯合創辦了早期的互聯網搜索引擎公司Excite.com。他還在2004年聯合創立了JotSpot，這家wiki 公司在2006年被谷歌收購。他的博客地址為JoeKraus.com，Twitter賬號為 @jkraus。

A time for change

????There comes a time in the mid-life of your sales development, where you, the CEO, need to help make a transition from expeditionary sales to process-oriented sales. I've heard of the rare expeditionary sales person who can also take what they've learned in the rough-and-tumble early days of selling and turn it into a more checklist-oriented, scalable sales process. But I have not seen it. Most likely, you, the CEO, will have to pick the brain of the expeditionary sales person, and take what they've learned to craft a more repeatable, scalable, process-driven sales method. And you'll likely have to hire a new head of sales. (For those of you wondering what happened to Eugene, Google (GOOG) bought JotSpot before we were ready to move to a process-oriented approach.)

Process-oriented sales person

????At this stage in your company's life, you probably have a product that fits the market reasonably well. But your sales costs are too high, your process feels sloppy and unpredictable, and the sales cycle is too long. In short, you need someone who thrives not on figuring out new things, but on optimizing the process in front of them. You want someone that truly enjoys building a sales machine.

????Process-oriented sales folks love repeatable, scalable methods. They love efficiency. They track their teams with detailed metrics. They implement software systems. They crave predictable growth. They think about building teams and managing groups of people to achieve a target. And they come from highly process-oriented sales cultures like Oracle (ORCL), IBM (IBM), or SAP (SAP).

????So, where do things go wrong? Things get bad in two primary scenarios:

????1. You bring in a process-oriented salesperson early in your company's life. This goes very badly and there are several symptoms. The person expects the sales "script" to be figured out. They expect you to know the position/profile of the person you're selling to. Engineering is constantly upset because sales keeps saying that they would be selling if only the product had some set of features that it doesn't currently have (expeditionary guys are masters of selling what you've got, even if it's not a perfect fit, instead of selling futures). This usually ends with the salesperson leaving.

????2. You hang on too long to an expeditionary head of sales when it's time to move to a process-oriented approach. This is typically characterized by the CEO feeling like there's not enough predictability in the business. There's resistance to the CEO's questions about finding patterns for the repeatable profile of the people you're selling to, and the timeline of leads to prospects to sales. The CEO wants greater reporting and visibility within the pipeline. This scenario should end in bringing in a new head of sales and moving the expeditionary person onto a special projects team (of one or two) that tackles the new products and initiatives that the process-oriented folks don't know how to sell.

????So, when you think about sales, think about these two types of salespeople and make sure you hire the right one at the right time. For every thing, there is a season. For every stage, there is a salesperson.

????Joe Kraus is a partner at Google Ventures. In 1993, he co-founded Excite.com, an early Internet search engine. He also co-founded JotSpot in 2004, a wiki company acquired by Google in 2006. Follow him on his blog, JoeKraus.com, and on Twitter: @jkraus.