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The 10X engineer is an idea that’s been around the technology industry for decades. But what about the 10X AE, BDR, or SDR? Tomasz Tunguz recently wrote in this LinkedIn post: “With AI, we will start to see sales outliers who meaningfully outperform & break quota expectations.
Let’s look at how AI can help you to achieve this.
What is a 10X Performer?
The 10X performer books ten times more business (AE) or meetings (SDR) than the average performer. Most define the 10X performer in contrast to their peers, but we think the greater impact for companies will be to define the 10X performer relative to each individual’s performance without AI. In other words, let’s aim to make everyone 10X better with AI than they were without it.
Here are 5 steps companies can take to help make this a reality for their sellers.
1. Account Prioritization
Becoming a 10X performer starts with effective account prioritization. After all, time is precious and the most important thing we can do is invest our time pursuing the right accounts. ABM intent signals are a popular way to help prioritize accounts, and they can be an effective indicator that a potential client is showing interest based on website visits. However, ABM intent signals can also be misleading, or even worse, delayed, as they can appear after the prospect has already started to engage with other providers. We need a signal that can prioritize accounts before it's too late; this is where propensity signals come in.
Propensity signals come from news, social media, earnings calls, and 10K’s where a company is expressing a strategic priority, initiative, or challenge that you can help them solve. Technologies like rule5 monitor these sources and automatically alert you to critical new insights such as breaking news or leadership changes that present a great opportunity to engage with your buyers; or where your accounts have strategic priorities, initiatives, or challenges that you can help them solve. Propensity signals can appear months and even years ahead of intent signals. We have one example where the propensity signal was at least 18 months ahead of intent. And every alert is an opportunity to engage with your account and highlight your value proposition.
2. Account Research
In-depth account research is crucial for the 10X performer, but doing it right can take hours or days per account just to complete your initial research, let alone to stay on top of changes. AI automates this process by gathering and summarizing insights from news, social media, earnings calls, and 10K’s to help you know your customer, speak their language, and show up with a relevant POV. Of course, this automation is a huge time saver for the 10X performer. But It also ensures the research gets done and gets done correctly so that no critical information is missed, allowing you to engage with your account and highlight your value proposition effectively.
3. Value Messaging
Propensity signals and automated research set the foundation, but the key is what you do with this insight. The 10X performer needs to quickly synthesize these insights into real action. AI builds on the foundation of insights to create high impact actions and messages. It uses generative AI to create messages that speak directly to your customers, focusing on their top strategic priorities, strategic initiatives, and business challenges. This personalized approach not only improves engagement and response rates but also helps to differentiate from your competitors.
4. Customer Engagement
Finally, customer engagement is where the 10X performer truly shines. Customer engagement happens when you bring all of this together. AI does the hard work and saves time, empowering the 10X performer to earn more time in front of customers.This is where the human element is key. By getting smarter about the customer’s business, you will earn the right to be in front of more customers and able to reach higher levels of the organization within each account. For example, rule5 empowers the 10X performer to deliver messages that directly address customer needs and pain points, improving engagement rates, optimizing cross-sell and upsell opportunities, and boosting revenue by offering relevant additional products or services to existing customers.
5. Operationalizing Across the GTM Organization
The 10X performer can't get there alone. While ad-hoc usage of tools like ChatGPT can be a great place to start, optimal success requires a strategy for the enterprise. This includes an overall generative AI strategy and then adopting tools that are: trained on your data and using grounding and RAG to eliminate hallucinations; optimized for your value proposition and buyer needs; secure and SOC2 compliant; integrated to your workflow and connected to key points of action such as CRM, ABM, Content Management, and the Sales Execution Platform; and aligned to your selling methodology.
Is 10X hype?
10X performance is a very high bar. Is this a bit of hyperbole? Perhaps, but that’s also true about the 10X engineer. But even if it’s 5X, 2X, or 1.5X, it’s worth it. We’ve lived in a world where single digit productivity improvements can move the needle in a meaningful direction, so let’s not set the bar unreasonably high.
Conclusion
In conclusion, an AI assistant like rule5 is more than just a tool; it's a strategic partner in your journey towards sales excellence. By addressing key sales challenges through advanced research, targeted messaging, and strategic execution, rule5 positions your team for success in today's dynamic market. With rule5, the concept of a 10X performer is not just hyperbole, but a reality within reach.
How we wrote this blog with AI
We used rule5 to help write this blog. We fed multiple pieces of content to rule5 which rule5 then synthesized into a single first draft. I then reviewed and edited for publishing. This saved me at least 3 hours.