GTM 131: Being CMO Under Marc Benioff of Salesforce, the Innovator's Dilemma and AI SDRs

Kraig Swensrud is the Founder & CEO of Qualified where he provides crucial experience and entrepreneurial energy to create the future of enterprise sales tech. Prior to founding Qualified, Kraig founded GetFeedback which was successfully sold to SurveyMonkey. Kraig also led marketing as the CMO of Salesforce during very formative years of the company's history. Discussed in this Episode:The parallels between the disruption caused by SaaS and AIHow pricing strategies are changing for AI productsWhy SaaS companies need to earning their renewalsThe impact of AI SDRs on your pipelineHighlights:13:26 The importance of product marketing in the growth of Salesforce20:17 Exploring the innovator's dilemma25:59 The next generation of software & building for non-human users39:05 Obsessing over your customers is key to success46:44 Using the V2MOM framework to drive company alignment50:43 The adage of 'hire fast, fire fast' is bsGuest Speaker Links (Kraig Swensrud):LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kraigswensrud/V2MOM Framework: https://www.salesforce.com/blog/how-to-create-alignment-within-your-company/Host Speaker Links (Scott Barker):LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/ssbarker/Newsletter: thegtmnewsletter.substack.com/Where to find GTMnow (GTMfund’s media brand):Website: https://gtmnow.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gtmnow/Twitter/X: https://x.com/GTMnow_YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@GTM_nowThe GTM Podcast (on all major directories): https://gtmnow.com/tag/podcast/Sponsor Offer:We recently became a Superhuman customer, and the response across our GTMfund community Slack and social channels was a clear testament to how Superhuman has been a game-changer for efficiency among leaders and teams. Superhuman is generously offering the GTMnow community exclusive access to 1 month free on the platform. If you add any teammates in January to your team, they’ll get a free month too.To claim this offer, go to www.superhuman.com/gtmnowThe GTMnow Podcast The GTMnow Podcast is a weekly podcast featuring interviews with the top 1% GTM executives, VCs, and founders. Conversations reveal the unshared details behind how they have grown companies, and the go-to-market strategies responsible for shaping that growth.Visit gtmnow.com for more episodes and other interesting content.