I can’t tell you how many times I’ve told startups to forget about raising money and instead to just go out and sell something. To me, if there’s any one area that New York City has a serious advantage in, it’s experienced salespeople. You can never have enough. They are the rainmakers—the ones who bring in the lifeblood of your company—cash.
But selling technology and digital media is a different animal. These aren’t dental supplies—this industry changes every single day. Given all the experience we have here locally, I thought it would be useful to put together a bunch of knowledgeable sales professionals to share what they know in a take aimed at full time sales professionals.
So, if you’re a sales rep, director, or VP selling digital media or technology in NYC, this event is for you, and boy have we assembled a murderers row of sales experience here.
The event will take place next Wednesday night, December 9th at 6PM at 111 8th Avenue at Deutsche Inc.
They’ll be talking about what they did to get to the next level... ie. was there a turning point in their sales career and when did things came easier... when did they "get it" and when did they really break through. They’ll also cover what kind of training and methods worked for them, what didn’t and the things that maybe go against commonly accepted sales wisdom.
Here’s the lineup:
John Roswech, President, Jingle Networks
Prior to joining Jingle Networks, John Roswech served as vice president of sales for Atlas Solutions (Aquantive), where he managed sales and account management teams for third party ad serving, search, rich media and landing page optimization, with revenue growing $100mm plus under his sales leadership. Before Aquantive, Roswech was senior director of sales with Matchlogic (Excite@Home), where he was part of the management team at Narrative Communications and responsible for rich media and lead generation products.
Jed Savage, Chief Revenue Officer, ScanScout
A twelve+ year Digital Media Sales veteran, Jed was the Director of Business Development for eBay’s Strategic Partnerships unit before joining ScanScout. He served for 4 years with Microsoft’s MSN division, holding positions including Eastern Sales Director, National Sales Manager and General Manager of MSN Sales. Jed increased revenue 10-fold in his first two years at MSN, and helped make the MSN sales division one of the leading revenue organizations in the industry. Before working with MSN, Jed created the National Sales Team for CBS Sportsline. As the company’s Vice President of Sales his team drove over $30 million in total revenue during his first 2years at the helm.
Jeff Stewart
Jeff is the founder of Urgent Career, a pioneer in the use of linguistic technology to match sales professionals with compatible employment opportunities. Jeff has founded over a half-dozen companies, which combined employ over 600 people. Immediately prior to founding Urgent Career, Jeff founded a technology-based financial intelligence firm that provides real-time analysis of semi structured text information for Hedge Funds and other Institutional Investors. The seeds of Urgent Career grew out of the observation that semantic analysis of massive amounts of textual data yields valuable insights.
Emily Twomey, SVP Sales, Oddcast
Emily has over ten years of experience in online media sales & interactive product sales. Prior to her position at Oddcast she held the positions of Director of Sales at Razorfish Networks and Senior Sales Manger at The New York Post. She started her sales career at the downtown style bible PAPER Magazine.
Mark LaRosa
Mark LaRosa is the CEO of QuotaCrush, a sales consulting company focused on helping start-ups with sales strategy and outsourced sales management. In its first year, QuotaCrush has brought two start-ups from zero sales to break-even – in a horrible economic climate. Prior to QuotaCrush, Mark was also the founder of Dynamic Mobile Data, a wireless enterprise software company focused on vehicle location and dispatch software. Mark sold over $20 million in enterprise software in this startup to companies including Pepsi, SHL, UPS, Purolator Courier and Kraft/Nabisco.
Vivek Sharma, Former Area Mgr., North America - Engine Yard
Vivek is currently working on a stealth startup, but he most recent ran the sales team at Engine Yard that covered the eastern part of North America and EMEA. He was the second salesperson in the company and best performing regional manager in 2008 and was on track for similar success in 2009. In 2008, he brought on nearly 40% of Engine Yard's net new revenue and closed the largest deal ever in the company's history. )