Thomas Klinger, MBA

Our outbound reps make 160% of the industry standard ($140K vs. $85K)   And that’s not an accident. It’s intentional.   The old model was broken: (1) Hire cheap junior reps (2) Churn and burn until a few survive (3) Measure activity, not outcomes   The new fad is wearing thin: (1) Hire cheap junior reps (2) Replace humans with fully automated AI SDRs (3) Mass spam that looks like marketing No trust, no creativity, no real pipeline   At Unify, we’re doing it differently: AI-empowered sellers.   Elite humans doing what only they can, supported by AI to scale what they shouldn’t. The results: (1) Ramp in weeks, not months (2) Outbound opps converting at 20% - higher than inbound (3) Reps paid for Closed-Won, not just meetings (4) And yes, one of our reps is pacing for $180K this year   Soon, an outbound rep at Unify will break $200K in annual comp. Not by accident but by design.   The future of outbound isn’t cheap headcount or AI bots.   It’s fewer reps, bigger outcomes, and top sellers getting paid what they’re worth.

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How to turn your AEs into a winning team: - product positioning - Discovery training - Command of the message - Great CRM setup - Nice Sales deck - listen to Calls in Gong ^^ tasks split across marketing, RevOps, AE leader, enablement. How to turn your SDRs into a winning team: - map the TAM - learn a variety of decision maker titles - cold calling training - set up email infrastructure - buy and set up multiple data tools - learn copywriting for exec communication - learn about SMTP, DMARC, DKIM - run complex math to determine how many leads are needed - collaborate with marketing for MQL handoff - optimize sequence settings to prevent bottlenecks - validate CRM data to prevent bounce leads - learn LinkedIn strategy for messaging prospects - learn to leave proper voicemails - run discovery on inbound leads - build a variety of sequences - run the math on A/B testing messaging - pass proper notes to the AE - follow up with leads that ghosted the AE - handle phone objections different than email ones - test a variety of tools, and fight for budget contstantly - help SDRs career plan and understand comp plan ^^ worst of all, the SDR manager has to do 90% of this in their own! Then SDRs and SDR leaders are paid less than their AE counterparts. Then when things aren’t working the SDR team is cut while the AE team is trained. How does this make sense? Been saying it for years #SDRsMatter

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I’ve reviewed 100s of discovery calls. The #1 difference between AEs converting 40% and AEs converting 70%+ of first calls is the number of problems discussed. And the top reps discuss fewer. Reps that don’t convert go wide, trying to find anything and everything to tie their product to. They think: “The more problems I find, the better chance I have of solving some of them.” Reps that convert go deep into the most important problems uncovered. They think: “I need to attach to a problem worth solving.” I built a discovery capture sheet that will help “guide” your conversations to go deep, instead of wide. You can get it here in this blog post (ungated and no cost - just make a copy): https://lnkd.in/gCaUJ4ZD

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Most sales reps HATE their CRMs. 40% of their time is lost in admin work. You know the drill: - Log every lead - Update every field - Report every tiny change But here’s what nobody likes to say out loud: → Salespeople want to SELL, not play data janitor 🤯 Almost HALF of your sales team’s work week is just… clicking, updating, moving stuff around in Hubspot, Pipedrive and other legacy CRMs. Wild. Now, imagine flipping that. Let’s do the math together (AI, hope you’re listening): 1/ Rep spends 40% of their time on admin work. 2/ Give them an AI Native CRM (like Breakcold 🧊🔨). 3/ That 40% is back in their pocket. All selling, zero admin. What happens? - More deals closed per rep - No need to hire extra salespeople to hit targets - Sales teams finally do what they’re paid for: sell The trick isn’t adding more “fluff AI” with fake features. It’s automating the boring stuff: → Lead movement? Automated → Task creation? Automated → Multichannel outreach? One dashboard (Email, LinkedIn, Telegram, WhatsApp) Now you get a happy rep, a happy founder, and a happy pipeline. People think the answer is hiring more salespeople. But you can already sell more with the people you have-if you give them back their time. --- That’s why we built Breakcold as the AI Native CRM for 2025, not 2010. What’s your biggest CRM headache right now?

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How to build a Sales Engineering career: 1. Start close to the customer or the tech: support, SDR, consulting, just get in the game. 2. Stay curious. Get hands-on, learn “how”, and ask “why” more than most. 3. Control the controllables. Your prep, your follow-through, your attitude. 4. Build technical skills, then go beyond them. Tech alone won’t get you where you want to go… 👇 5. Master communication! Simplify complexity, tell clear, compelling stories. 6. Become fluent in business. Great SEs connect tech to business outcomes. 7. Build internal relationships: SEs → AEs → Product → Support → CS. 8. Grow your external network with intention… don’t wait until you need it. 9. Find ways to make impact that is valuable AND visible. 10. Self-educate constantly. Your company training is the bare minimum. 11. Teach, coach, and mentor… The more you give, the more your influence scales. (and the happier you become) What’d I miss?

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