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Each week, Revenue Operations expert Rosalyn Santa Elena shines the spotlight on founders, CEO's and Revenue Leaders from hyper-growth companies and dives deep into the strategies they implement to drive growth and share their learnings through the process.
Rosalyn brings you the most inspirational stories from revenue generators, innovators and disruptors, as well as Revenue Leaders in sales, marketing, and, of course, operations.
Let's unpack everything that optimizes and powers the revenue engine with this brand-new podcast from Growth Forum https://www.growthforum.io
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Welcome
to the Revenue Engine Podcast.
I'm your host, Rosalyn Santa Elena,
and I am thrilled to bring you the
most inspirational stories from
revenue generators, innovators and
disruptors, revenue leaders in sales in
market, and of course, in operations.
Together we will unpack everything that
optimizes and powers the revenue engine
Growth Forum production.
Are you ready?
Let's get to it.
With the explosion of data, there
is definitely no shortage of data.
The challenge is getting more meaningful
data to help your business reach
and engage with the right prospects.
With the volatility of the market
the last few years, the volume of job
changes has increased significantly.
Many individuals have changed roles
even multiple times in the last
two or three years as a business
trying to maintain quality data for
your customers and your champions.
Is critical, both for retention
and growth within an account, but
also for potential new prospects.
In this episode of the Revenue
Engine podcast, Christian Kletzel,
the CEO and co-founder of User Gems,
shares his insights on how to drive
net new revenue and retain existing
revenue, leveraging the power of data.
So take a listen and learn how to
start generating qualified pipeline.
On autopilot, so super excited to be
here today with Christian Kletzel,
the c e o and Co-founder of User Gems.
For those of you who may not be familiar
with User Gems, User GEMS is an AI driven
prospecting solution for revenue teams
that uniquely positions them for success
through surfacing existing customers
as new prospects when they change jobs.
And automatically identifying
new prospects that look
like your best customers.
So welcome Christian, and thank
you so much for joining me.
I am so excited just to learn more
about you and, and learn from you.
Christian Kletzl: Thank
you so much for having me.
Really excited to chat here.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Awesome, awesome.
So before we dive in, I always like to
talk about, you know, career journey.
I mean, you've spent time at
Microsoft and Google, McKinsey, right?
And you also.
I actually co-founded a
company prior to User Gems.
Um, so maybe can you share more about
your background and your journey, um,
you know, prior to founding the company?
Christian Kletzl: Mm-hmm.
So, uh, yeah, int I think it's
generally an interesting story
of like how I got there and
actually how, especially how I got.
Kind of like the role
within user channels.
Mm-hmm.
So I'm, I'm originally from
Austria, uh, in Salzburg.
Sound of Music is often the
association for an American.
And, uh, so I studied computer science
there and then went, went to Microsoft.
So I was always like
very engineering heavy.
I was an, uh, a developer back
then, and then I came to US.
Did my MBA in the US and that's where
then I, I stuck around, started at
Google, started their own startup.
But I think what's also interesting
is that, so I started it with
my identical twin brother.
Oh.
Which means basically probably very
similar in skillset set and interest.
And at some point we had to decide, so who
does what, like who does the engineering
and who does the selling piece?
And he's like, I was, I was in the US.
I had a little bit better
English because I studied here.
So I was like, all right, geo,
geographically speaking makes
sense that you are doing it.
And I think, so now I lead, I'm, I'm
the CEO, but I especially lead the,
the revenue organization, sales,
uh, marketing, customer success.
And I think it's just really
interesting because I was actually
the one, uh, studying engineering.
He actually studied business.
But I think it, it just also
shows that like when, if you
are the engineer, you can still
ultimately end up being in sales.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm.
I love that.
I love that.
Um, so, you know, a lot of times
when I talk to founders, right?
An idea for a business
starts with a problem.
There's.
You know, there's some problem,
there's a challenge, or even sometimes
there's just some frustration, um, to
solve, you know, which ends up leading
to an idea, um, for our company.
So we know was this the
case for our user gems?
And maybe, what was that original vision?
Christian Kletzl: Oh God.
Oh my God.
Uh, how much, how much time do we have?
Uh, um, so we, we actually started out,
so when we created the first company,
it was, it was called Shelf Flip.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: It was
actually a B2C solution.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Okay.
Christian Kletzl: And what we did
back then is we analyzed what people
purchased online through the receipts.
Like what you get from Amazon,
from other online stores.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Okay.
Christian Kletzl: And we told you
if you were to resell it for how
much you would be able to resell
it and we could help you resell it.
And what for us interesting was a
little bit like this, you get internal
data like you purchasing, and then
we compare it with external data.
So the like for how much you can sell it.
But that was a completely different
product, a completely different
customer, completely different direction.
Um, and.
That one actually didn't go anywhere and
we completely pivoted away from this.
But then we did other things,
always focused on where is publicly
available data there that we can
use and then turn that into value.
So, um, for us it was less about
the prob problem, although there was
a point where there's like, where
we actually saw this need ourself.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: So we, we worked
with data and then at some point
a customer changed their job.
We saw that, this is really
interesting, and then Okay.
So we already have data
that we see online.
Can we create a product
that does exactly that?
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Got it.
Got it.
And so that was sort of, kind of
the original vision, but you know,
has, how have things changed Right.
Since starting the company?
I mean, it's been like
almost five years, I think.
Um, yeah.
How has that changed or has it?
Christian Kletzl: Yeah, so
I mean, um, it certainly had
changed a lot at the beginning.
Like we, even at the beginning of
User Gems, we were, um, we helped
companies identify influencers.
Mm-hmm.
Among your own users.
So once again, a little bit like
more for companies that sell to b2c.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Christian Kletzl: Sell to end users.
Um, and then it switched to, okay,
we already have this stay there.
We identified the chop
change, now we sell to b2b.
And surprisingly from that moment
on, and this was also the moment
where, People showed real interest.
They, they actually signed real
contracts and gave us real, real money.
From then on it, it changed not as
much anymore, like the, the, the
general sentiment of user terms.
Back then and now it's actually
you create, you take a signal.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: Kind of
like an intense signal.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: And
turn this into value.
And job change is just a very clearly,
easily describable signal for this.
But for us, it's really what other signals
do we have that we can then turn into?
It saves or marketing motion.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Got it.
Got it.
So let's talk about that data, right?
So prospecting customer data.
I mean, I think with the, just
the explosion of data, there's
definitely no shortage of it, but
Christian Kletzl: No, no.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: But the
challenge is always, you know,
getting more meaningful data, right?
That meaningful data to really help
your business reach and engage,
right, with the right people.
So what are you seeing, you know,
kind of companies maybe doing right?
And of course, What they're doing wrong
when it comes to sort of acquiring the
right data to help you, um, target the
right accounts and the right prospects?
Christian Kletzl: Yes.
Oh my God, I've, I've so many
opinions about this because there's,
there are actually two things, like
I think the first one is what you
said, um, data versus meaningful
data, like what works now and.
The, and maybe the second
piece is actually kind of like
turning this data into action.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Christian Kletzl: And I think
these are two different, two
different very important things
like data versus meaningful data.
Um, I think the, the issue or the risk
is a little bit, you learn from the
past, but the world changes much quicker.
Like if, if we look at the, let's
say the success of a cold outbound.
10 years ago, and the number of steps
that were necessary back then versus the,
the number of different actions we are
doing now, there's a huge difference.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: So I think it's
actually the, the difficulty from,
from data to meaningful data is
actually staying ahead of the curve
and identifying, okay, what works
today versus what worked in the past.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: So even like previously
you, you did your cold outbound, you
sent a few messages and it worked.
And now you need to be much, much smarter.
It needs to be the right
person at the right time.
So you take intent of the organization
with maybe a relationship, as in our
case, like a relationship that you
have to that person or maybe some fa
familiarity because they're previous
user or maybe they evaluated you.
So you need to be much smarter
and much more fine tuned around.
Which data actually works.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: And then the second
piece is that actually we have so
much data, even so much great data,
that um, we are seeing a huge drop
off from kind of like the, the
awesome work that marketing does.
Mm-hmm.
And getting us the signals to
actually then having an end user.
And oftentimes that's an SDR
or AE or CSM act on that data.
Like if we were to look at this
dropoff rate, it's oftentimes.
80, 50, 80% that actually gets
lost somewhere in the middle.
And I think that's also where RevUps
comes in and can help everyone.
Like, here's the data that was generated,
but data alone doesn't have a value.
It only has a value if
it gets actioned on.
And.
I think the last few years we got so much
data in that, that we're overwhelmed and
now it's actually around, can we turn
this data into, into action reliably?
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Oh my gosh.
You're speaking my language.
I think I was actually just saying
that this morning to somebody, it's
not about the data, it's about what
are you going to do with the data?
What's
Christian Kletzl: Yes!
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Right.
What is that Next, next best action.
And I was telling somebody, if
you can tell, The , you know, the
customer, what is that net next
best action and help guide them.
That's powerful.
Giving me the data,
giving me the reporting.
Even, even the, um, even the ANA
analytics is still not enough nowadays.
Right?
You want to take that?
Christian Kletzl: Oh my gosh.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Tell
me what to go do, right?
Help me.
Christian Kletzl: Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Absolutely.
Because like at the same time, especially
over the last year, we are, we are
looking at how can we be more efficient?
How can, like, how can one person do
what previously two did, but at the
same time, we actually increasing
the number of signals we have.
So it's, it gets much, much harder to,
for this one person to do the job of
two in while being drowned with data.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Yeah, 100%.
I love that.
And I love the plug for
Rev Ops so thank you.
I didn't pay you to do that.
Um, you know, when I think about, you
know, just we were talking about kind of
the last few years, but the volatility
of the market has been crazy, right?
The volume of job changes, obviously
it's increased significantly.
Many, many people have changed roles.
Sometimes multiple times
over the last few years.
Yes.
Um,
Christian Kletzl: Love it.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Right.
And as
Christian Kletzl: Personally love it.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: You love it?
Yeah.
And as a business
Christian Kletzl: From, from my company.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
It's great, right?
Because as a business, but for other
people, you know, trying to maintain that
quality data for your customers, right.
And those champions is so critical,
both for not only retention and growth
within an existing account, but also
Christian Kletzl: Yes.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: To
identify new prospects.
So maybe from your perspective, you
know, how should revenue leaders
be thinking about this data, right.
To help retain.
Um, and grow within their
existing customer base.
Christian Kletzl: I, I actually love that
you started with the retention first,
because I think what's really interesting
is if I look at my conversations and
compare them a year ago to now mm-hmm.
A year ago it was all about
new business and growth.
Retention is interesting, but
actually like churn wasn't that high
because everyone still had money.
It was all about new business versus
now, so many of my conversations
actually start with the retention angle.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: Because like, number
one is that, Um, a champion leaving is
the second biggest reason for churn.
Number one is bad onboarding, but if
my champion is leaving, and oftentimes
specifically that, that the people
were like, if I'm, if I have a really
good relationship and they love my
product, then they tell me anyway, but
this middle piece of the ones that they
could go either way and maybe they,
they, they churn or maybe they don't.
These are the ones I might
not hear immediately.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm.
Christian Kletzl: And so I want to know
as soon as possible if, if my champion
is leaving from the organization.
And interestingly, like now, I would
tell you, and also importantly where
they're going, but actually there's a
second piece for retention that's really
interesting is any new decision maker
right now, any VP or C level person,
when they join a new company, their
first job, maybe their only job in this
environment is actually evaluating the
tech stack that they're inheriting.
How can I save like my 30, 50%?
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Christian Kletzl: Right there.
So the first thing they do,
like basically first month
they listen to what's going on.
Second night they start thinking
about what they should be doing,
and third months they take action.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: And if you are
too late in this conversation,
if you haven't already started a
conversation with this new stakeholder,
then you are on the chopping dock.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yep.
Christian Kletzl: So the number
one thing there is actually,
it's, it's, it's checking.
Who's leaving, but also who's
joining my customer accounts.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Yeah.
It's funny, uh, because a lot of times
when a new leader comes on board,
they're doing that assessment, but
they also want, a lot of times they
just blindly want their own tech stack.
Right.
What they're used to.
Right.
What they're used to using, and
they start to rip and replace.
Right.
Christian Kletzl: And I love that too.
Okay.
Because certainly on the other hand, like,
if this person is my previous customer
and they move to a new organization,
then I want to be in that conversation.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Exactly.
Christian Kletzl: As
soon as possible as well.
Right?
So, Um, that's, that's in the,
the flip side of that coin.
So fortunately there's, there's this
good flip side as well in terms of
let's make sure I'm part of this
conversation as soon as possible.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Yeah.
So that's kind of my next, I
guess, leads into sort of that next
question is, you know, how should
they be leveraging that data, right?
To identify new prospects or even,
um, you know, maybe better target
accounts that they can go after.
Christian Kletzl: Yes.
Yes.
I think these are actually
two, the, the two big ones.
It's, it's identifying job changes have
always been also an indicator for what
is this company actually looking for.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: So there's so
many stories around the, if you
hire your first, let's say head of
finance, it means you're now ready
for more sophisticated financing tool.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: So that's a, this
the, like the, the chart postings
and the hirings should always
be an indicator for the intent.
Strength of that account.
Yeah, but you're also right, like
if, if for example, a company, um,
I haven't seen any intent signals.
Um, but um, if there are a few users or
champions joining that account mm-hmm.
Then for me that's, this bubbles
up the, the, um, importance of that
account because now I have a much, much
better way getting into that account.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Yeah.
I think about just, you know, when
people, um, When people leave an account,
like we were talking about, they, they
wanna bring in their own tech stack.
They start to look at that.
But then also, you know, I love the
point that you brought up about,
you know, those folks that you
don't talk to all the time, right?
Your customers, that you don't
talk all the time, and then
their champion leaves, right?
And, and yes, there's an opportunity
to now go follow that champion
to their next company, right?
And that's a net new
potential opportunity.
But then also, you know, you wanna
know ahead of time so that you're
building that surround sound
and building that relationship.
With whoever is still there.
Christian Kletzl: Yes!
Yeah,
Rosalyn Santa Elena: yeah,
Christian Kletzl: yeah, yeah.
And now more important than ever.
So a very big initiative for us is looking
into how many people are in my QBR.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: How many people
in that organization hear about
what user terms is doing for them?
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah,
Christian Kletzl: So, I'm
actually, I'm actually preaching
that this is as much a product.
Uh, job as it is a customer success job.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: The CSM should bring
him in, but the product should actually
see, how can I tell as many people in my
customer about the success they're seeing?
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Christian Kletzl: Like it's, it's
about usage for the end user,
but it's about statistics and
analysis for the decision makers.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Yeah.
I love that.
I love that.
Um, you know, we talk a lot about.
Uh, pipeline generation, right.
Kind of top of funnel and all of that.
And I always, I like to talk a lot
about retention and growth because
I think we don't, we talk about
customer a lot, um, but then we
Christian Kletzl: mm-hmm.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Still
focus on top of funnel.
Right.
We tend to kind of grow.
Christian Kletzl: Yes.
Rosalyn Santa Elena:
Moved in that direction.
But, you know, pipeline gen is always
just top of mind, you know, and I saw
on your website, like you have a guide
that says the cure for pipeline anxiety.
Right.
How to generate qualified
pipeline on autopilot.
And to me that's like a dream come true.
Right?
Or I think for everybody, that's a
dream come true to be able to do that.
Um, so maybe can you share some
of your thoughts around this?
Like what, you know, maybe what best
practice recommendations you have, you
know, for rev revenue leaders Right.
To generate better,
more qualified pipeline.
Christian Kletzl: Yes.
And I think that the first one is,
is, um, just looking at what we did.
Is who like tracking your champions.
We talked about it, but I think
there, there are a few things
that, that's interesting.
So basically we have this program actually
literally on autopilot, on purpose.
So we can show that we trust our own data.
Yeah.
But for us, if a chop change
happens, we automatically push
this person into a sequence.
And we have, based on persona, based on
seniority, we have different sequences.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: But they are like,
we have response rates in the 25%
on this with very, very little work.
And this program alone adds somewhere in
the range of, like, we started out at 12,
I think now we're at 16% of our revenue.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Wow.
Christian Kletzl: And, and what I, what
I find so interesting about this, I
think it's the only marketing program
that actually scales with your size.
Like every other program, if you go,
for example, intent or if you want to
put money into to LinkedIn advertising,
at some point you hit, hit the limit.
Like you can't scale it much further,
um, without losing efficiency.
But as long as your
company is growing, then.
You have more people to track and it
actually scales with the business.
But the main thing for us is that a
lot of this can be fully automatic
and especially in this environment
where I need to be more efficient,
that's really the way to do it.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah, I think
that's really, that's really powerful.
I think we don't track our.
Customers, again, not enough focus
on customer a lot of times, because
I know when I've left a company,
that's one of the first things I do
right, is look at the tech stack.
What do we have, you know, what,
what are we actually using?
Right?
And how are we using it?
Christian Kletzl: Yes.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: And like you said,
then they start to, you know, you,
you, if you don't have that champion,
you're on the cutting block, right?
You're gonna be, yeah.
One of those companies that they would
say, oh, we don't really need that.
Christian Kletzl: Yeah.
And, and it's like if, if you're
too late in this com, like if this,
Rosalyn Santa Elena: mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: This person comes
in, they evaluates everything.
If the first time you hear from them is
when they say, Hey, we're not gonna renew.
This convers, like changing this back.
Yeah.
To a non-renewal is the
hardest thing in the world.
Like I think that's what we,
that's what we talk to customers.
There's like going back from this
super, super difficult and that's why
the earlier you have this conversation
and the earlier you can actually
influence the conversation, show
them the success that they're seeing,
that they might not be fully aware.
The much, much higher your successes.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Yeah.
I love that.
I love that.
Um, you know, as I think about, you
know, the revenue engine in this
podcast, I'm always hoping others will
learn how to accelerate revenue growth.
Right.
Empower the revenue engine.
So maybe from your perspective, you
know, what are the top maybe two or
three things that you think all revenue
leaders should be thinking about today?
To really drive revenue?
Christian Kletzl: I think that there
are two things and then not, not even
that much related to to user terms.
So I think the first, would we just like
going back to what you asked about like.
The, the data and so much data being
available, we've really seen it across
the organization that so often it's
actually not about the data that's
available, but about the enablement
and the actioning of that data.
And so when like so much of our.
CSM job is actually, it's not about
here's the job change, but rather here's
the job change and what happens next.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: And so for a
revenue organization, I would really
look into every single signal and
how much I'm actually using it.
And by how much we go as deep
as looking into how many steps
in a sequence did you action.
And the results are actually, I think in
90% of cases surprising because we find
that yes, you did reach out to, let's
say 50% of the people you should, but
it was one step and then they dropped.
Like then you dropped off.
So the question is how, and, but
we all know that a big success of
sequences are in step six to 10.
It's about like 40% or so.
So, Which means that I want to, like, I
would look into, do I get to these six to
10 steps in the signals that matter to me?
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: And so
that, I think that is one.
And the other one, the, the one thing
that worked really well for us, And
this is kind of like a no-brainer,
but I want to go into detail.
There is the sales and
marketing orchestration.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: Like I think we got
better and better to call it ABM abx.
So at least we're aligning on
which accounts are we going after.
Right.
Like five years ago, that
was the big conversation.
Save that.
This marketing just did this.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Christian Kletzl: At least now we have
the same accounts we go after, but often
time, that's where the alignment stops.
And who are the people?
What is the messaging?
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: So what we are
religious about is really making
sure ABM is not on the account level,
it's actually on the contact level.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm.
Christian Kletzl: So if sales
reaches out to a person at the
very same time, this person.
Is in a managed, uh, campaign on LinkedIn
where they see the same messaging.
And I think if you talk about what
changed over the last five years, it's
like you need to be so like totally
clear on who it is and have the same
messaging across all the channels.
So this p because our attention
spans like two seconds, we need to.
We need to make sure these two
seconds add up to the 20 seconds.
And the only way we can do this is by
orchestrate how we reach that person.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Yeah.
Oh gosh.
Again, music to my ears,
sales and marketing alignment.
Everybody kind of focused
on the same goals, right?
And kind of driving to the same strategy
Christian Kletzl: Yes.
Rosalyn Santa Elena:
Instead of like this..
Marketing does this and
hands it off to sales.
It's no longer like that.
Right.
I always talk about revenue
kind of being a team sport.
It's everybody stays involved
Christian Kletzl: Oh my God.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Right?
Throughout the process.
Christian Kletzl: Absolutely.
And, and let's add customer
success into this as well.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Absolutely.
Christian Kletzl: As you say,
Rosalyn Santa Elena: yeah.
It's the entire funnel,
especially in recurring business.
Right.
And the SaaS model, I always tell
people it's like when you sign that
contract for the first time, that's just
the beginning of the journey, right.
With the customer, or should be at least.
So
Christian Kletzl: yes.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: I love that.
Um, okay, so what about, you know,
maybe shifting gears a little bit, you
know, as a CEO and, you know, two-time
founder, you know, if, is there like
one piece of advice that you would
maybe give to another CEO or founder?
You know, kinda that one thing
that has made all the difference?
Christian Kletzl: We actually, when we
have new hires, um, I'm, I'm meeting
with them and I walked them a little
bit through the history of user terms.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: And, and I also share
a little bit the learnings that we have
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Christian Kletzl: Along our journey.
And I think if there's, if there's
just one advice, like certainly in
B2B anyway, where you need to, you
need to commit to it for, at the very
least, like b, B2B is so often also
like you might be a good fit, but.
But it might just not be the right timing.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah,
Christian Kletzl: and I mean, in
DA, in dating, it's always a lie
when you say, it's not you, it's me.
But in b2b, say in B2B sales,
it could really be the case.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Christian Kletzl: And we've seen
so often that like, it's just like,
I have this, this, this quarter.
I have a different goal, a different
O P R, but next quarter it fits.
And so often companies come back, so
you need to commit to a certain time.
But I would actually make this even
bigger, like, um, Airbnb, like if you
look at the history of Airbnb, it's like
there were these thousand days of pain
where there was no progress until there
was something like they changed how they
took the photos and then it accelerated.
And I think in our situation
it was actually the 1500 days
of pain starting in like 2014.
But I think what the, the very important
thing is, It's actually twofold
and that's hard, but not give up.
But actually knowing when to
pivot, I think that's the big one.
Like how do you know?
How do you know?
Like I couldn't, even if I go on,
this is not gonna be successful.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: Versus I just need
to stick it out a little bit longer.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Got it.
Got it.
Okay.
Yeah, that's helpful.
Thank you.
Thank you for sharing that.
Um, well thank you so much for joining me.
Um, you know, but as we wrap up,
before I let you go, I always
ask two things of all my guests.
One, what is the one thing about you
that others might be surprised to learn?
And two, what is the one thing that you
really want everyone to know about you?
Um, and sometimes, sometimes
it's the same thing.
I've had a lot of guests say kind of the
same thing, so something that people might
be surprised to learn and something that
you really want others to know about you.
Christian Kletzl: Mm-hmm.
I, I, I already used up the
surprise because I, I, I would've
said that I, I founded the company
with my advent friend, brother.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: I was
gonna say, actually, when you
were talking about that, I was
like, that would be a great one.
Cause you,
Christian Kletzl: and,
and you acted surprised.
So this would've been Ed.
Um,
Rosalyn Santa Elena: yeah, actually that
is a good, that's a really good one.
And actually be interesting to
see if you have ever tried to, you
know, like if you look enough alike
that you can actually, you know,
IM kind of impersonate each other.
And take each other's place
Christian Kletzl: less often now.
But there was a situation where,
um, because I was the, I was the
seller, so I went to the conference.
Like I, I went to all the conferences
and then one conference I got
sick, but we already had a ticket.
We didn't have a lot of money, so I was
like, alright, we just take the ticket.
And Stephan, yeah, my,
my, my twin brother.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Christian Kletzl: So he went there.
Had it un like basically
with my name, he went there
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Uhhuh
Christian Kletzl: and there were
really people coming up to him and
that I already knew, but obviously
he didn't and, and that is not fun.
Okay.
Like how do you react in that situation?
So haven't done that in a while.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Okay.
Um, is there anything that you
want everyone to know about you?
Yeah,
Christian Kletzl: I don't know if
it's about me or more in general.
I think the, the other thing
that I mentioned, like if I
look at my history of, of.
What I've done starting with being
an engineer so far from removed
from anything related to sales.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Mm-hmm.
Christian Kletzl: To actually
then changing into very sales.
Like I was the first
seller at the company.
Um, I was the first VP of sales.
I'm still involved in a whole
lot of sales conversations.
I think what I just find really
interesting that ultimately.
Even if I didn't believe it.
It's an acquired skill.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
Christian Kletzl: Um, you can
actually, like, if you approach the
sales process from an engineering
mindset, there are steps you can do.
And so I I, for, I guess for the, for
the engineers out there that might think
about a startup, You, you, it gets easier.
Okay.
In, in terms of the selling
and it can actually be learned.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
I love that.
I love that.
Cause I mean, sales is such a, that,
I think that's what's so amazing
about the sales profession, right?
You could be, come from any background
and you could be successful in sales.
Right.
And it, and it is about
mindset, your approach.
There's methodology to it.
Christian Kletzl: Yes.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: All right.
There's a, there's a science to it.
Right.
That makes sales successful.
Christian Kletzl: Yeah.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah.
And I can actually see the engineering
background actually fit really nicely
into that kind of the methodology, right?
And the approach.
Christian Kletzl: The methodology, yes.
But I still remember myself being
nervous before every single sales call.
So I feel that that is actually the.
The hard thing to, for I
guess the engineer, or at
least back then it was for me.
Rosalyn Santa Elena: Yeah, I love that.
Well, thank you so much for sharing and
thank you so much for being on the show.
I really appreciate just all you sharing
your experience, you know, your knowledge
and some of, and some really great advice.
Um, every time I record with a
guest, I'm always like super excited
to go back and listen because, and
just kind of hear a lot of the tips
and, um, advice that you share.
So thank you for sharing your time.
With us.
Christian Kletzl: Awesome.
I, I hope it's useful.
Thank you so much for having me.
Thank you.