---
name: sales-and-revenue-operations
description: |
  Comprehensive sales and revenue operations skill. Use when building a sales team, doing founder-led sales, hiring first sales reps, navigating enterprise deals, implementing product-led sales, designing sales compensation plans, defining ICP, mapping buyer personas, or optimizing the revenue engine (RevOps). Activates for: sales strategy, rev ops, revenue operations, sales enablement, sales compensation, ICP, ideal customer profile, buyer persona, sales process, deal execution, lead scoring, lead routing, lead lifecycle, MQL, SQL, pipeline management, CRM automation, sales qualification, BANT, MEDDIC, founder sales, enterprise sales, product-led sales, startup sales, SDR, AE, quota, ramp, commission plan.
---

# Sales & Revenue Operations

Full-stack sales playbook: founder-led sales, team building, enterprise deals, RevOps, ICP definition, buyer personas, and compensation design.

---

## Quick Start

1. **Assess stage** — Founder-led, first reps, or scaling?
2. **Define motion** — Inbound, outbound, PLG, or hybrid?
3. **Build ICP** — Who are you selling to?
4. **Design process** — Discovery → Demo → Close
5. **Instrument RevOps** — Lead lifecycle, scoring, routing

---

## ICP & Buyer Persona

### ICP Stack (build bottom-up)

```
┌─────────────────────────────┐
│       BUYING CENTER          │ ← All decision stakeholders
├─────────────────────────────┤
│       USER PERSONA           │ ← Daily user
├─────────────────────────────┤
│       BUYER PERSONA          │ ← Signs the check
├─────────────────────────────┤
│       COMPANY PROFILE        │ ← Firmographics
└─────────────────────────────┘
```

**Company Profile:** industry/vertical, size (employees/revenue), stage, geography, tech stack

**Buyer Persona:** title/role, seniority, goals & KPIs, decision authority, what they care about

**User Persona:** daily workflow, pain points, tech savviness

**Buying Center Roles:** Champion, Economic Buyer, Technical Evaluator, End User, Blocker

### ICP Scoring

| Factor | Weight |
|--------|--------|
| Problem severity | 25% |
| Budget available | 20% |
| Champion identified | 15% |
| Technical fit | 15% |
| Decision timeline | 15% |
| Expansion potential | 10% |

### The 50-Company Test

List 50 specific companies that fit. Find the buyer's name at 20 of them. Reach out to 10. If you can't do this, your ICP isn't specific enough.

For full persona canvases, buying center maps, interview questions, and fit scoring: see `references/full-guide.md`

---

## Founder-Led Sales

**Core principles:**
- The founder IS the product — your credibility closes deals early competitors can't
- Your biggest competitor is indecision (40-60% of B2B purchases end in no decision)
- Sell before you build — Figma mockups can secure first customers
- Close the laptop — focus on diagnosis, not demos
- Book next meeting on the current one to maintain momentum

**When to hire:** Wait until ~$1M ARR and a repeatable process. Hire in pairs — you need an A/B test.

**Hiring framework:**

| Stage | Who to Hire | When |
|-------|-------------|------|
| Founder-led | Nobody | Before $1M ARR |
| First AEs | 2 reps | After proven repeatability |
| SDRs | 1-2 | When inbound overflows |
| VP Sales | 1 | When 2+ reps hitting quota |

---

## Enterprise Sales

**Buying committee roles:** Champion (internal advocate), Economic Buyer (signs), Technical Buyer (evaluates), End User (uses daily), Blocker (can say no)

**JOLT method for indecision:**
1. **Judge** level of indecision
2. **Offer** a firm recommendation
3. **Limit** exploration by building trust
4. **Take risk off the table** — de-risk the deal

**Key tactics:**
- Identify and arm the champion — they sell internally for you
- Address FOMU (Fear Of Making a Mistake), not just FOMO
- Make procurement's job easy — prepare all documentation upfront

---

## Sales Qualification

**BANT:** Budget · Authority · Need · Timeline

**MEDDIC:** Metrics · Economic Buyer · Decision Criteria · Decision Process · Identify Pain · Champion

**Rule:** Qualify ruthlessly. "No" is a successful outcome. Disqualify on the first call if fit isn't there.

---

## Sales Enablement

### Sales Deck (10-12 slides)
1. Current World Problem, 2. Cost of the Problem, 3. The Shift Happening, 4. Your Approach, 5. Product Walkthrough (3-4 workflows), 6. Proof Points, 7. Case Study, 8. Implementation, 9. ROI/Value, 10. Pricing Overview, 11. Next Steps/CTA

### Demo Structure
Opening (2 min) → Discovery Recap (3 min) → Solution Walkthrough (15-20 min) → Interaction → Close (5 min)

### Objection Handling

| Category | Response Approach |
|----------|-------------------|
| Price | ROI angle, payment terms |
| Timing | Urgency, cost of delay |
| Competition | Differentiation, unique value |
| Authority | Arm the champion |
| Status quo | Cost of inaction |

---

## Revenue Operations

### Lead Lifecycle Stages

| Stage | Owner | Entry Criteria |
|-------|-------|----------------|
| Subscriber | Marketing | Opts in to content |
| Lead | Marketing | Basic info provided |
| MQL | Marketing | Fit + engagement threshold |
| SQL | Sales | Accepted, qualified via call |
| Opportunity | Sales AE | BANT confirmed |
| Customer | CS | Closed-won |

**MQL = Fit Score (who they are) + Engagement Score (what they do). Neither alone qualifies.**

**MQL-to-SQL SLA:** Contact within 4 hours; qualify or reject within 48 hours.

### Lead Scoring

**Explicit (fit):** Company size, industry, title, tech stack

**Implicit (engagement):** Pricing page visits, demo requests, email clicks, product usage

**Negative:** Competitor domains, student emails, unsubscribes

### Lead Routing Methods

| Method | Best For |
|--------|----------|
| Round-robin | Equal territories |
| Territory-based | Regional/vertical teams |
| Account-based | Named accounts / ABM |
| Skill-based | Complex deals, multi-product |

**Speed-to-lead:** Contact within 5 minutes = 21x more likely to qualify. After 30 minutes, conversion drops 10x.

For routing decision trees and automation playbooks: see `references/routing-rules.md`, `references/automation-playbooks.md`

### Pipeline Stage Hygiene

- Enforce required fields per stage to block advancement with bad data
- Flag stale deals (2x average time in stage) automatically
- Alert on stage skips (Qualified → Proposal without Discovery)
- Require reason codes on close date pushes

### RevOps Metrics

| Metric | Target |
|--------|--------|
| Lead-to-MQL rate | 5-15% |
| MQL-to-SQL rate | 30-50% |
| SQL-to-Opportunity | 50-70% |
| Win rate | 20-30% |
| Speed-to-lead | <5 minutes |
| LTV:CAC ratio | 3:1 to 5:1 |

For scoring models and lifecycle definitions: see `references/scoring-models.md`, `references/lifecycle-definitions.md`

---

## Sales Compensation

**Standard structure:** 50% base / 50% variable (OTE). This is a starting point, not a law.

**Modern comp plans align with customer outcomes, not just bookings.** Reps who close churny deals should earn less than those who close sticky customers.

**Ramp periods:** 3-6 months for SMB, 6-12 months for enterprise. Provide guaranteed draw or reduced quotas during ramp.

**Simplicity rule:** If reps can't instantly calculate how an action affects their pay, the plan is too complex.

**Common mistakes:**
- Incentivizing only bookings without customer quality
- Over-complicated plans with too many variables
- No ramp protection for new hires
- Ignoring churn in comp design

For detailed comp frameworks: see `references/guest-insights.md`

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## Sales Metrics

| Metric | What It Tells You |
|--------|-------------------|
| Win rate | Sales effectiveness |
| Sales cycle length | Process efficiency |
| Pipeline coverage | Forecast reliability (target 3-4x quota) |
| Lead-to-Opportunity | Qualification quality |
| CAC | Acquisition efficiency |
| Quota attainment | Rep performance |

---

## Related Skills

- `outbound-email-strategy` — Cold outreach
- `pricing-strategy` — Pricing decisions
- `go-to-market-strategy` — Full launch planning