Startups, Strategy, and Success - Caleb King - RevOps 500 Podcast - S02E01
Are we recording?
Speaker 2:Is this thing on?
Speaker 1:Yes. It is. Welcome to RevOps 500, where we invite the world's top marketers to answer the tough questions facing growing organization. Oh, sounds important. I'm Sajeel Qureshi.
Speaker 1:And I'm Gil Bates. Join us as we dive deep into the world of rev ops. We'll be learning strategies and expertise from firsthand experience. Rev Ops 500 is sponsored by Computan. They provide technical and development expertise to growth focused marketing teams.
Speaker 2:Let's get started.
Speaker 3:Sajeel Qureshi here with another episode of RevOps 500 where we interview some of the world's greatest and smartest B2B marketers around. I know Caleb you're laughing about that, but that's okay. Today, I'm really, really excited to be talking to a HubSpot superstar, someone who actually works for one of the coolest HubSpot apps around, and he used to work at HubSpot helping agencies as a cam and has spent around, like, half a decade in channel sales and account management. Also, fun fact is he also worked at Tesla. But right now, you could find him as a as a rock star account executive at Supered.
Speaker 3:Caleb King, welcome to rev ops 500, sir.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3:Alright. So let's get right into it, Caleb. What is one RevOps myth that you can share with our listeners?
Speaker 2:One RevOps myth is that I know what rev ops is.
Speaker 3:What what what do you what do you mean by that? What do you mean you it's a myth that you know what it is. Like, you really
Speaker 2:I'm I'm being kind of see, one rev ops myth now I would say is that anyone knows what rev ops is or that anyone actually has a definition for rev ops. It's one of those things where it has been buzzing for a couple of years. We're still in the hype phase of it. And I'm not saying it's fake. It's real.
Speaker 2:It is a real thing, but it is hard to put your finger on it. There are definitions. I've I myself have written out definitions also, but I seem to forget them over and over, and I've read definitions. In fact, today, on LinkedIn, I read a definition that I nodded firmly on. I'm like, yeah, that is what rev ops is.
Speaker 2:But, I'm not saying it's a bad thing. I'm not saying I was faking. I'm just saying RevOps is one of those terms or one of those ideas that is just like, when you smell it, you know it. It's it. Or when you see it, you know, it's it.
Speaker 2:But it's hard to just say, like, this is a singular one line definition of what it is. And there are other words like that too that I think, like, GoTo market is a word like that. Strategy, strategic is a word like that. When you see it, you know it's that.
Speaker 3:Okay. So so let's let's go on that. So what you're saying is a myth is you don't know RevOps and not many people do, but, you know, it's just kinda like it's it's just something you know it when you see it. So what what is an example of Rev Ops that you have seen? And you said, you know what?
Speaker 3:That's Rev Ops. I'm like, what what is a when when have you seen it?
Speaker 2:That's a great, great question. So anytime I because, like, my day to day, right, is sales. I was in sales, Tesla HubSpot here. And so I firmly look at things from a salesperson perspective, not because I want to, but because I have to. That is my day to day.
Speaker 2:So for example, at Supered, right, we're this fast growing startup, but there are not a lot of processes in place because it was founder led and founder plus 1 AE, now founder plus 3 AEs. So we are literally selling and building the processing at the same time. So what is something that when I smell it or I see it or when I build it myself, I'm like, oh, this is RevOps. It's like, okay. What how do I actually choose who to target?
Speaker 2:And then how do I translate that into our system, which is HubSpot CRM, plus LinkedIn, plus surf. You know? And that then is like the idea is how do I find more people that I wanna talk to and talk to them? And then there's like, oh, but when I'm actually doing this day to day, what does that mean for my system and my process and me in setting up a target account list, creating a property that's a tier one property of target account, translating that into the target account view in HubSpot, thinking about what the reporting looks like to figure out if we're successful on that. How do I use LinkedIn Sales Nav?
Speaker 2:How do I use LinkedIn? So that's one thing. Even that explanation took, like, 5 minutes, and you're probably, what are you talking about? So it's hard to encapsulate. But when I'm when I have an end goal as a salesperson, I'm doing it, and then I'm like, wait.
Speaker 2:No one's told me how to do this. I gotta figure it out and then build it into the tools or tech stack. That to me smells like like, RevOps, and I'm like, oh, that's why this thing exists.
Speaker 3:Okay. So so that's kinda like the so you're looking at it from a sales angle because, you know, you know, you're an AE. I mean, your job is is biz devs in lead gen interest, all sorts of things. Now when you're when you're in a place like Supered, how does that how will that translate on the other side with, like, marketing, customer success, and making sure that customers become, like, evangelists and stuff like that? You you know, at a start up, it's very different because, you know, like you said, you're building the process as it's happening, as you're doing business.
Speaker 3:Right? So what what is that like? I mean, the other two ends of it.
Speaker 2:So it's actually kind of cool. Speak most directly, because at Supered, our go to market strategy is a little bit different. We call it surround bounce. So everyone is market everyone is marketing. Like, we are all marketers.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But there's one person in the end who is in been in charge of it. Right? But I can speak most directly to the service side or the success side because never at a company have I felt more close to net revenue retention. Because I've always been getting new, and then there we hand them off, and it's, like, their problem. But if we are trying to hit our goals as a company, which is this year, 3 mil annual recurring revenue and 10 mil than a 100 mil, like, I cannot ignore if this bucket is leaky.
Speaker 2:Right? Because that directly impacts the team's goal. So if we're churning, you know, 10,000 a month and I'm bringing in 12,000 a month, like, I can't ignore that. Right? And so so what does it look like at Supered?
Speaker 2:Then we are setting up processes, right, for how do I properly in the sales cycle, how
Speaker 3:do I
Speaker 2:properly collect information, set the expectations, and then set up the handoff to service, and you stay involved in that process when needed. And now on the back end, this would actually be more sales ops, but it still falls under the umbrella of Rev Ops of, like, okay. Then how do we build into the numbers of, like, if they upgrade or if they upgrade in x months, like does that affect sales numbers that affect services and our retention, Right. So that all kind of I think about all that and the larger building dollar for ops as well.
Speaker 2:Maybe that's a mistake because some people might say that's sales ops. That's service ops. That's marketing ops, but I feel like it's all revenue. Yeah. It's all rev.
Speaker 3:So that's gotta be hard, though, because, you know, you've, done account management, accounts, you know, account executive. And now you're trying to like you said, you can't ignore that bucket is leaking. You know, if churn is happening and you're bringing in 12,000 a month and 10,000 months going out the door because customers are upset, how do you learn that skill? Because, you know, you're always so used to it. Like, okay.
Speaker 3:I'm bringing the revenue in, and I'm gonna go find more revenue the next month. You know, you got your quota. You tried to get your deals done. How do you how do you go from, like, a big corporate, like, you know, bureaucracy? I don't see bureaucracy, like, not a bad term, but a much more stable and structured environment like HubSpot or Tesla or all these other places you've been.
Speaker 3:Now you come super, and, you know, you you can't just hand off to somebody else. Okay. Your thing now, not my problem. You handle it. How how do you learn customer success at the same time when you got numbers to hit, you know, keeping the lights on?
Speaker 2:You just do it. I like it. Right? Just do it. It's hard.
Speaker 2:Right? Like, I've gotta think about I thought I had a lot of things to think about before. Now I have 3 times more things. But that's why you just gotta make a decision. Like, if you wanna work for a small company, is there enough risk for the is there enough reward for the risk?
Speaker 2:And for me, personally, I'm only, like, 2 months in, but, like, it's rewarding for me because I feel like I feel ownership of this business. I'm not the owner, but I feel ownership of it. Like and so I like that. I feel like my acumen as a business person rather than just like a a sales mercenary is increasing. And that is, like, exciting for me for a personal development standpoint because now I see I wanna become better.
Speaker 2:If I can be understand business better, then I'll be better at anything that I do.
Speaker 3:So it's more like a necessity is the mother of innovation type of a thing, right, where, you know, you have to do this because, you know, there is no one else to pass it on to. Right? you know, this is someone that, you know, you sat with them. You got their trust. You you got them to you supered.
Speaker 3:Now I wanna make sure and if they have a problem with it, there's no really no one else they can I mean, there must be other people they can talk to, but, you know, they're probably gonna talk to you because you're the one that brought them into the fold? Right? So you you feel ownership over it that way, which is interesting. So that's a cool perspective.
Speaker 2:And, like, one of the cool things about Supered is they Matt's kind of go to market strategy. He hired more customer success or partner success people before the salespeople. So it's kind of flipping the mod SaaS model upside down. So we had 3 PSMs when there was only 1 salesperson. Now we're even.
Speaker 2:But the way that I think about it is really interesting. It's, like, at an established company, a large corporate company, there are slim lanes, and we just say the thing you say is that's not my job. This is my job. That's not my job. At it, you can still say that.
Speaker 2:Like, sometimes I do things. I'm like, that's not my job . But why am I saying that now when there are 11 of us? Right? Like, if I say that's not my job, who is that helping?
Speaker 2:It is just hurting everyone. Right? And so that's what I mean when there's, like, ownership and commitment to the the rising of this entire company, which will benefit us. But there is they're not there are some ways, but they're more I think about it. They're more specialties.
Speaker 2:There's definitely people that are specializing marketing, customer success, developers, and then salespeople, but it's not like that's not my job. I only do this. It's like, this is my specialty, but we're trying to get this thing to rise. Everyone's trying to get this thing to rise.
Speaker 3:So you guys are working part of us, like, as one team working together on building out these systems, and that's kind of how the the necessity of mother being mother of innovation helps. So it sounds like you're you're in the you're kind of in the thick of building up like a sort of like a Rev Ops system. Right? Where this is what good customer success looks like. This is what good sales is looking like.
Speaker 3:This is what the hand off looks like between marketing and sales. And when keeping a happy customer, turning them into, like, a, you know, into support or someone who can refer new people to the team or to the company. You know? So what's that process like right now? I mean, like, is it something you guys talk about weekly, daily, hourly?
Speaker 3:I mean, is it like, something you set time up for when you're building up a Rev Ops engine like this? Give us the view from the ground floor.
Speaker 2:It is it's hard be it's hard to answer that because there are some people on our team are very good at being proactive about it, personality wise. I don't know. they're doing the right thing. They're, like, thinking about the system and, like, alright. We're gonna build this first and then, like, thank you.
Speaker 2:So some beautiful, you know, views, some dashboards. I mean, some of some people I'm kind of in the middle. Some people are just like, where speed is so important to us that even though we know this is important, I'm not going to waste any time doing this until it becomes unbearably painful without it, without this view or that this dashboard without this process And personality wise and coming from HubSpot and working with Rev Ops agencies, I was always firmly like, no. You need the process. You know, like, you need the setup.
Speaker 2:I really, or else everything else is broke. You know, like, it's not even work. Nothing's gonna fit in. You're gonna have bad data. You have no report.
Speaker 2:And, yes, I agree with that, Sajeel. Maybe some people listening to this will hate me for saying this. But now that I'm in a high growth start up, I see the truth that, like, no. Actually, speed is the top priority. Like, get the customer, get the x y z, do the thing, and then it will become so painful that you need a process behind it.
Speaker 2:And so the truth is in the middle there. People have to, you know, pull from both sides. But when you're in it, and trying to grow this and trying like, speed becomes a very real thing to where, you know, operating principle that's rises to the top is just like, until it becomes painful, I'm gonna keep doing this because then it'll be a good problem when it's painful because it means I have the meat to put into the whatever form.
Speaker 3:You know, it's it's funny you talk about that, Caleb, and and it and it makes a lot of sense. Right? Like, you know, for example, look at companies that have HR departments. You you wouldn't think of, like, a startup as a company that has an HR department, but when it becomes so unbearable, like, you know, recruiting and hiring and policies and stuff like that, when it becomes so unbearable trying to do it without one, that's when you start to when you go and make that first HR hire. Right?
Speaker 3:And and that's like, the typical process sort of department and and typical corporate structures, corporate America, anyway, that, you know, you get that well, once you get the HR department in there, then you got policy structure. You can't just it's not just like a a free for all. Right? Yeah. It's kinda gonna think so you you kind of grown out of the so it's almost like, you know, you grow into that sort of a of a need.
Speaker 3:So what you're saying is that is is that kind of where it's at? Like, you know, you're saying that we're a start up. We're on the ground level trying to build up our revenue, our business, our identity, and our process all the same time. At the same but, you know, we will grow into some of these processes when it becomes unbearable. We we have too many leads, then we go get a CRM, or we get, like, a customer acquisition strategy, right, when we have customers to acquire and we've done it and, you know, all those sorts of things.
Speaker 3:Right? Is that kinda how it is? Or
Speaker 2:kind of. , I'll give a verifiable example from that you just made me think of. So we use Slack, internally, and so someone, probably Matt, set up a a Slack notification for when someone visits our pricing page on our website. Right?
Speaker 3:I
Speaker 2:actually don't know how it works. Probably through HubSpot plus Slack plus tracking code. Right? So we get this notification. It goes into our revenue channel.
Speaker 2:Now to be clear, our revenue channel is marketing, sales, and service. So it's not like it's like that's how we think. I love that we call it revenue. It's everyone. Right?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Get a notification. Hey. Pricing page visit. Matt, our CEO, Ashley, and Blake, and Chris are a like, all right.
Speaker 2:What's the process behind this? And, come with your recommendation. How are we going to handle this? I keep it. Just go.
Speaker 2:And then our rec my recommendation is like, there is no process. Whoever sees this replies in the thread first, I got this. And then is he that person is responsible for following up, making sure you get a yes or no. Do you wanna meet everyone else who sees it? Nice with them on LinkedIn, you know, kind of supports, but you do need one person to just be, I'm gonna take the lead.
Speaker 2:I'm going to send tasks through myself. I'm going to stay on top of this. And, and that's like, that's my recommendation. Now Sajeel hearing that, like, that is a bad scalable as not scalable. But but we're, like, Matt at then.
Speaker 2:He was like, okay. That's gonna be painful eventually and not sustainable, but let's I'm fine with that for now. And so that's a good example of where I'm just like, yes. This isn't scalable, but I'm not gonna spend half my day thinking about it or my entire day thinking about iterating it when we have one lead, potential lead. Like, let's just go, see how many meetings we book, and you want to become painful, we can very easily figure out how to rotate this.
Speaker 2:Right? But the main questions are the main questions. Is this this person is interested. Is someone making it easy for them to talk to us fast? That's the only question I care about.
Speaker 2:Right? And then we can think about all the things after. But unless we answer that question, is someone from Supered making it easy for someone to book a time and talk to us fast, then why even talk about the other stuff? Then that's a good example.
Speaker 3:Okay. So, you know, it's a really good example. Obviously, it is like a very Rev Ops y sort of thing. Right? You know, there's someone on the pricing page.
Speaker 3:You want them to talk to a human being right away, so you set up a system, whatever system it is. Right? You know, it's a Slack notification that goes in, and someone just has to jump in and give that person the, you know, the TLC, tender loving care to, you know, like, hey. You're on the pricing page. Is there something I can do for you?
Speaker 3:Do you wanna talk? You know, it's like when someone walks into a retail shop. Right? And you and you're like, oh, someone's walked in, you know, you at least greet them. Same idea.
Speaker 3:Scalable, not scalable. I mean, it's up for debate, but, yeah, you know, it's there. So, you know, like but let's talk about something like that or even something really that technically. Like, I mean, what what kind of technical things in this, you know, at Supered keep you up at night? Like, the like, you know, it's new.
Speaker 3:It's very, v its infancy. Right? So, I mean, when you're when you're building up, like, this alignment between, you know, your customer success people, your CSMs, and your and and you guys in revenue, What are some of the technical pain points on there in terms of, like, you know, what what you're doing then with that stuff?
Speaker 2:Technical in terms of our internal tech stack or our internal our Supered the prop?
Speaker 3:No. In in terms of your internal tech stack. Like, you know, building up this Rev Ops, you know, like these processes and things like that?
Speaker 2:Frankly, very little of that keeps me off of it. I mean, because then you're
Speaker 3:relaxed, easy going guy. I know that. I mean, like, you know,
Speaker 2:those keep you up at night.
Speaker 3:But, you know, what can keep Matt or the rest of team up at night then maybe?
Speaker 2:I think that you know, because we think about if I think about RevOps, I think about, like, a HubSpot admin or, like, the CRM admin, which is a very real thing and very important. But, like, I feel ownership of all of that, but I don't feel I it's just my perspective. Right? So, like, why do I feel the burden for? I feel the burden for increasing top line revenue for Supered however we can because that's my specialty.
Speaker 2:That's what I came on to do. And does the technical setup impact that? Yes. Have I had suggestions and actually built dashboards and processes and documented things myself as I'm doing them? Yes.
Speaker 2:Because I know they will help other people increase top line revenue, which is what I'm here for care to do. Right? But as far as, like, thinking about the architecture, like, I don't think about that because we have a lot of better people on my team to do that who have actually been partners in HubSpot admins. So I just don't feel a responsibility for that. Now I do wanna be clear here.
Speaker 2:Like, is this the right way to do it? I don't know. Yeah. Is this the way we are doing it as a bootstrapped 10 person startup? Yes.
Speaker 2:If we were venture funded, would we have a full time rev ops person or hire a rev ops agency? That would be the right thing to do, but but we made a clear decision to be, say, bootstrap because of the whole that's our strategy. And so it's just the reality that we have to live in right now.
Speaker 3:That makes sense. I mean, like, you know, you've got you've got very little, you know, in terms of, like, resource terms, like, you know, it's a startup. Startups are typically, you know, especially ones that are not funded. Right? They're they're bootstrapped.
Speaker 3:They're just kinda, you know, getting their getting their wings to fly more or less. And, you know, when you don't have that, it's hard to think about everything because you get overwhelmed. Right? So so now let okay. Let let's talk about maybe something that you have maybe seen that some of your your your end users struggle with.
Speaker 3:Like, you know, super users who are also, you know, usually HubSpot admins, partners, those sorts of things. You know, what what are things that maybe you've seen them struggle with from a from a from a a systems and processes standpoint?
Speaker 2:I mean, I think one the the biggest thing so, like, our primary audience our primary target customer right now is HubSpot Partners. Right? Right. We do sell to end users, and eventually, that will be our total grasp on our dip, but we've been able to go to market just long HubSpot Partners first. It's our strategy partner first.
Speaker 2:And so the question that you asked were some of the pain points that they struggle with and they steal with end end users. Is this is this the larger word would be adoption. Right? But what does that actually mean? It means, like, one of the big premises that we build on is, like, since we're so HubSpot biased, at least I come from a world where hubs I'm Hub HubSpot biased, and I've worked at HubSpot.
Speaker 2:I was like, let's shoehorn everything into HubSpot. Right? Let's make sure everything has orange on it, every process. But at the end of the day, even HubSpot itself does not live just in HubSpot. Right?
Speaker 2:So I think that's one core thing that we have to realize and be okay with it. Like, yes, crafted not followed is very real. However, it's not about getting people to adopt our tool, our app. It's a gap about helping businesses operationalize their process, and is our app or is our service helping them do that? And so that's why, like, what is built on is like, hey.
Speaker 2:We're giving partners or service providers a tool to be able to span apps, span tools, take out Think Bin, Monday dot com, whatever. ClickUp, HubSpot, Salesforce, Dynamics, like, because none of their processes is just gonna exist in one application. So if you are a consultant helping them build processes, you know that there's a, ERP included. You know that there's an email client included. You know all these things.
Speaker 2:So the cool thing that Sumbert is building is like, hey. We're doing it across apps. The pain is just trying to solve for one thing. The the solution is, like, how can we teach and train and enable across all the software stack that they need for their specific process?
Speaker 3:Yeah. And and using a tool like that where, you know, it does help people walk through different steps on how to do things or how to get things done like Super can do, it probably even helps them adopt adoption in their own rev ops world. Right? Because, you know, everybody every business has different steps. What what customer success is, what sales.
Speaker 3:The sales has to do this part. Marketing has to do this part. These are all steps. Right? Steps and and communication needs to happen.
Speaker 3:So, I mean, do you do you see people, like, partners adopting super to do those sorts of things, especially when, like, newcomers come on to the team and stuff like that? Like, it's more like the assimilation in into the into into the processes and stuff like that of of those partners and agencies?
Speaker 2:Yeah. I think the the good ones for sure. They they come to a customer or internally even. They say, like, okay. Where are people living right now?
Speaker 2:You may need to change that or not. Right? Because there is a very real question. Is there a better tool for this? Do you need to be living out of 3 tools or 1?
Speaker 2:Okay. Great. If it's truly better, let's live out of 1 or 2. But then not just like I think it's always difficult when you're trying to impose something on someone, And maybe we need to come to a point where we're like, yes, there's a point where we make recommendations. Yes.
Speaker 2:Maybe HubSpot can pull in your service and marketing and sales, ideally. But then at a point, we just need to think, alright. What is your full process? What's the best tool for this? And we can live with 5 tools.
Speaker 2:We can live with 4 tools as opposed to 35. Right? But there still will be more. And so the best partners, I think, realize that. And then that's kind of what we built for is, like, waiting now that you've applied your expertise, How do you operationalize that?
Speaker 2:And super is simply the conduit. We're the pathway. We're not saying, hey. Look at super. We're pink.
Speaker 2:We have a lightning bolt. Look at us. Like, that's actually not what we wanna do. What we wanna do is, like, make these partners better. And and so they're the ones delivering value.
Speaker 2:We're just a conduit to do it.
Speaker 3:You're you're, you're a pretty interesting guy, Caleb. I mean and I mean that as a as a in in a complimentary way. But, like, you know, like, where where do, like, where where did, like, this, like, this, like, like, this interest in in in, like, account management sales? Where where did it come from? I mean, like, you know, where does that I mean, it seems like you're genuinely interested in in this stuff.
Speaker 3:And most people say, oh, you know, I got knocked into this somehow or whatever. But where where did where did that come from exactly?
Speaker 2:My interest in sales or my interest in HubSpot partners?
Speaker 3:Well, I mean, both. I mean, both. I mean, you know, you you're trying to help them. Right? You know, you're trying to help them with a with a product.
Speaker 3:Right? I mean, if it's not this one, it'd be something else. But, you know, you have a passion for HubSpot, HubSpot partners, you know, those sorts of things. Where where does that where where did all this stem from, I guess?
Speaker 2:I did get knocked into it.
Speaker 3:You got knocked into it?
Speaker 2:I did get knocked into it. You go. And then the why?
Speaker 3:Who did it?
Speaker 2:Yeah. And then it actually has developed. Right? So I've been thinking about this motivate this phrase. Right?
Speaker 2:Motivation or excitement is a luxury. We think a a lot of times people are like, you gotta follow your passion. You gotta be passionate about that. It'll bleed through it, but what's the most important for a Salesperson? You gotta be passionate.
Speaker 2:I have been so unpassionate about my job for so many years and so many different companies. Right? So I realized when I am when something does, like, no. This is a pain, and this is something an actual software that solves the pain or an actual person out of the hell, you've gotta stoke that fire. Right?
Speaker 2:Because you don't know when it's gonna go out. So you've gotta rely on that past and stoke it, feed it. Right? And so part of it is the problem that we're solving right now. Part of it is the person or persona we're solving is for who I worked with for the past couple of years that feel close to them because I've seen the business payment services companies.
Speaker 2:And part of it is just like the culture that I'm in at. There's excitement of my colleagues that runs off on me. Right? And then when I see that, like, I've got a I know I've got to protect it. Right?
Speaker 2:But to use that story, I kind of the shortest version is I was introduced into sales and polish. I was a door to door salesman. I hated it. I never recommend anyone do it, but good things came from it. Mainly the fact that I'm extreme often, I can do very hard things that very other people few other people can do, which is a good thing for a salesperson to have.
Speaker 2:Now, but I don't recommend anyone doing. So I am door to door salesperson, went and traveled for a number of years. I worked in New Zealand, went to Taiwan.
Speaker 3:So I
Speaker 2:developed myself, came back to America with my lovely wife, Nicole, and said, I need to make money. I've been traveling for 10 years or 8 years. Who will hire me? What do I and I need to make enough money to support us, if not more children, if they you know, to and so sales is logical for 1st step. And and then I just kinda like sales, different companies, different companies, got really lucky, landed at HubSpot, got introduced to partners, stayed at HubSpot for 3 years as a cam came to Supered, and now I'm excited because I know the problem.
Speaker 2:Supered has a really good solution. And I'm excited to say about software. I like software. So I did get knocked into it.
Speaker 3:So, you know, and necessity being the mother of innovation again. Right? I mean, the same same sort of, thing. So let's talk a bit about that now. You know, you mentioned you got knocked into it.
Speaker 3:I know I know you were abroad for a while. I think you're doing language, language language teaching. Right? So, I mean, how can I let's take a product like Supered or even what we've been talking about now, like, rev ops or whatever? Like, if you if you had the knowledge that you have now of, like, you know, processes, you know, customer success, sales, marketing, and, you know, you're working with, like, a language speaking institution how would you do because I'm guessing they didn't have much of a rev ops operation or organized structure like that either.
Speaker 3:Right? You know, shaking your head. So, like, what would you what could they learn from Caleb now that they didn't get from Caleb, say, maybe 10 years ago or something like that, 5 years ago, whatever it was.
Speaker 2:That's a great question. And I'm on the fence of what I would say. because I don't it's not I wanna be clear. This is not advice. This is just not.
Speaker 2:Right? I'm not a good Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. No. We're just jamming. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Of course.
Speaker 2:I would say to them, fix the main problems first. Like, fix your business problems first. Yes. You can download a free CRM, and, actually, you probably should because that's very low lit. Download the free HubSpot CRM.
Speaker 2:That way, you know what students are students, you know what families are families, you know who you want to target. But, like, you know, some of these smaller businesses, it's just like I don't wanna I'm only gonna say fix the main things first. The main things are, do you have enough income coming in sales if you don't focus on that. The very next question is, do is the income that is coming in retained? If it is not, fix that.
Speaker 2:And then you can think about everything else. But it's it goes along kind of that start mentality of, like, fix the main things first. Is there money coming in? Are we keeping this money? And then we'll think about everything else.
Speaker 2:But it's not exclusive. Like, you can and should probably have, like, a free CRM while you're doing that because it will help you get more income and retain it. So sorry for everyone else that sorry for former self when I was selling HubSpot. That hates me for saying that.
Speaker 3:So now where where do you see the future of all this stuff going? I mean, you see apps like, you know, Supered and things like that that make it easier to connect the dots and, you you know, make apps. You talk about Superd being the conduit between the HubSpot and other applications. Where do you see the future of of of that industry or rev ops or or these things heading? Like, do you have any sort of crystal ball that you, you know, you can kinda look into, or where do you think where where do you see things going?
Speaker 2:I think that the future the present and the future, I think is people. People. People. And I don't know if that would change. I hope it never changes.
Speaker 2:So, you know, if you are a partner , you are a partner, but if any partner sees Supered and what it does, it's sexy. It's like, holy smoke. That is a magic trick. How did you do that? It's like the first time I saw HubSpot sequences.
Speaker 2:I was like, that's sexy. That's cool. Right? But it doesn't work if they're not a person behind it thinking critically. But the software is never going to solve a business problem in a meaningful, meaningful, meaningful way.
Speaker 2:So if I see a future, there are millions of softwares out there. There are millions more that'll come out. Right? And all of them will be useful. And all some of them you'll see them and be like, well, that's sexy.
Speaker 2:That's cool. Supered is like that. But there has to be a person or people behind it driving the strategy, driving how are we gonna change our business with this competitive advantage? And that's very much how I feel about Supered. Supered is a competitive advantage until it's not until the market is accurate.
Speaker 2:But that's not a problem because if I'm preaching that like this is the conduit you are the competitive advantage you the how fast, how early, how transformative you allow this to be for your go to market strategy. That is the competitive advantage, and that will not go away because you will adapt. That's the future that I see, and I hope that's always the future. The future belongs I won't say belongs to, but the future is, like, some people get lucky. We all get lucky.
Speaker 2:However, you can control how critically you're thinking about the problem you're solving and how much you're foreseeing. So if you're just thinking, like, something's gonna solve my problem, HubSpot is gonna solve all my problem my data problems. It's not. It's gonna make them worse. However, if you're critically thinking about how you're using it, if you're critically thinking about how you're using Super to transform your services business and change how you go to market and deliver, that is that's the future, I think, and I hope it will always be like that because it belongs to people who are proactively thinking, changing, adopting, that's figure as well.
Speaker 3:So you think it's most people will say that, you know, AI or some sort of stuff like that is the future. You're more thinking it's gonna be more of a surgical, more like a lot like the present where people are going to drive change, innovation, adaptation, you know, those sorts of things. Is that is that kind of where you're going with that? Or
Speaker 2:I hope. That's my prayer. Right? Like but all of our technology is kind of AI. Technology is AI.
Speaker 2:It's just we put a name on it. Right? So I pray and hope AI does not take over critical thinking. That was uniquely human. Right?
Speaker 2:So, yes, to answer your question, yes. Like, the technology is gonna keep on getting better. We are making the technology so we can stop it from getting better, or we can think continue to ask the question. What are what is human? What is human?
Speaker 2:What is better about us than these machines that we're making? And I think that that ultimate is again I wanna I want humans to be the driver still, that I see.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So, I mean, like, it's saying let's talk about Supered in the future maybe. Right? Maybe humans are not the ones writing those cars out. Right?
Speaker 3:Maybe it is an AI bot that is doing it, but somebody, a human perhaps, is orchestrating what cards to put where and why cards need to be there in the 1st place and between which platforms and making the decision about which platforms there are, Something like that. Is that probably pretty accurate? Or
Speaker 2:Yeah. Not even taking a step further. It's like, okay. That's, like, the day to day how we're actually implementing and transacting and actually delivering it. But then the human element still is, like, if you are in if you're working out that business where that partner who is using Supered to deliver a better client experience for customer, how are you transformed?
Speaker 2:Like, how are you then as AI or Super Devolves or whatever? Then how are you positioning yourself and making your business valuable? I mean, Google Translate has existed for years. Right? But it hasn't taken over the world.
Speaker 2:You know what I'm saying? Like, there's still has to be someone thinking bigger and thinking like, okay. Everything that he was used to do, now machines do. But they're still they're only in the gap of in value that a human has to think about, and that's not alone.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. That makes, makes total sense. So, you know, we've been talking with Supered, but for anybody who doesn't know anything about it, why don't you give us a little rundown about what Supered is and what and what you do there and and everything else?
Speaker 2:Yeah. God. So, you know, it's so hard to explain software. Right? It's so hard to explain software unless you've felt the pain before, and then you're like, oh, I get it.
Speaker 2:Alright. Yeah. Supered is a software, an app. You the end user experiences that as a floating Chrome extension that helps whatever software you're using, become easier and better to use. Right?
Speaker 2:And so the end user, whatever their process is, whatever software they're using, Supered, you experience it as a floating Chrome expansion wherever you are, guiding you and telling you how to use this so that you can get to your end goal. We sell to end users directly, and usually, like, admin would do that, but we're gonna market with partners. So what is Supered for partners, it allows partners to create those experiences for their customers, which is ultimately when you're a services company, you're in the business of creating great experience for your customer. So Supered is a conduit that allows you to create that and say, like, hey. It is Computan that
Speaker 2:that you are like, your experience is great as Computan has guided you through these processes.
Speaker 2:So that's a very vague answer, but that's what it is.
Speaker 3:It's kinda like a wizard, isn't it? I mean, like, in a way where it's like, you know, you're building customized wizards for people to use on the on their in their daily life. I mean, if you ever bought, like, a device, like, a Google device and try to set up, like, a Nest home or a phone app, I'll tell you, go to the phone app, put this thing in. Now go here. Now go there.
Speaker 3:But you're doing it for your daily life without programmers' help. You know, it's like a Chrome extension. You can create your, you know, yeah, you can create your wizards for your clients, for your team to get through get through their day, get through their life, get and and adapt whatever needs to be adapted quicker.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Yep. A wizard, work instructions, digital adoption platform, floating knowledge base. Like, it's all these categories in one. But, yes, it's a wizard.
Speaker 3:Got it. Alright. Well, you know, Caleb, this has been a a lot of fun. You know, I learned a lot. I mean, you know, I mean, we have a good vibe together, obviously.
Speaker 3:You know, it was, great to, you know, hear you talk about, you know, how rev ops is on the ground floor, you know, when you, when you're learning and, you know, you start off finding ways and you yeah. Myth is you didn't even know you know what it is. So I mean, like, you know, it's been it' great to have you on, and, you know, I really appreciate , you doing this with me.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. And one day, Sajeel I will interview you about how Computan started. You teased me with that, that you started with hotels. You're like, you know, IT provide for hotels, and you've grown to this. That's a fascinating story.
Speaker 3:You know what? Yeah. You , can have it at any time, and, you know, my pet dog might listen to it. Right? I mean, that like, a I'd be happy to waste the the Internet hard drive space on that one.
Speaker 3:So that's a given. No problem with that.
Speaker 2:Awesome. Thanks for having me, man.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And anybody listening up there, if you, if you liked it, you know, if you like Caleb, Caleb, where can they get where can they get a hold of you at? Where can people reach you?
Speaker 2:LinkedIn. You know, Caleb King, make sure it's my face. There are other Caleb Kings. Yeah. A lot
Speaker 3:of Caleb Kings out there. Right? So yeah. So, I mean, anyways, like, if you wanna get ahold of Caleb, you know, hit him up on LinkedIn. If you want to, tell somebody about the episode, by all means, listeners, go ahead and do that.
Speaker 3:Caleb, again, thanks for coming on. This is, it was great having you.
Speaker 2:Alright, man. Thanks so much.
Speaker 3:There's been another episode of RevOps 500, and we'll talk to everybody soon. Take care.
Speaker 1:And that wraps up another episode of RevOps 500. Thanks for joining. For show notes and other episodes, visit us at revops500.com. RevOps 500 is sponsored by Computan, providing technical and development expertise to growth focused marketing teams.
