S2 Ep 8: Merel Roest, Mastering Internal and External Storytelling in Strategic Sales

Episode Speaker Notes: Merel Roest — Head of Sales at Guardey, Founder @ Blackbird GTMThe Episode:Merel Roest spent her first five years in marketing before moving into enterprise sales — and that background became her edge. At Freshworks, she closed a three-year, group-wide customer service transformation deal with a 5,000+ employee American organization, selling a product that wasn't fully built yet.Getting to yes meant running two parallel sales motions at the same time: one across multiple client stakeholders all the way up to their CEO, and one internally — working level by level through a hierarchical American HQ she could barely get face time with from her satellite office in the Netherlands. She won both.Now Head of Sales at Guardey, Merel is building the sales org from the ground up — rewriting the pitch, cleaning the CRM data, and using custom-built GPTs to accelerate her team's learning curve.What you'll take away: How to build a deal story that actually lands, how to run an internal sale when the product isn't ready, and what it really takes to go from President's Club rep to first-time leader.Key QuotesOn ditching the standard deck:"It was me talking at you, not me talking with you. I shaped it completely around them — about solving their problem, not about us."On demos that keep people awake:"A lot of account executives click through buttons. That's where people fall asleep. We created personas — this is your customer, this is their problem, this is how they'd use the tool."On the most powerful moment in any demo:"Based on what you've now seen, how would this help you? Let them say it."On social proof that actually works:"Everyone has a logo slide called 'Our Customers.' I hate it — it says nothing. What problem did you solve for them? That's the story you should focus on."On conviction in the deal:"I already knew from my gut from the beginning — I don't know why, but I just felt it. This one's ours."On product belief as a prerequisite:"I would never be able to sell something I don't feel is actually going to help. Your product needs to be good."On the internal sale:"I didn't just have a pitch deck for the customer. I had a pitch deck for our internal stakeholders — one for my line of reporting, one for the solution engineers. Everyone needs to know the ins and outs of why we think this could work."On sales culture:"If your employees are happy, your customers are going to be happy. Culture is very underestimated in high-pressure SaaS sales environments."On moving from rep to manager:"I wanted to earn this person's respect before going into coaching mode. And I told him: I'm going to make mistakes. If I do something that doesn't sit well with you, I hope you'll tell me."On perfectionism at a startup:"Done is better than perfect. I have to tell myself that every single day."Resources & LinksReferenced in the episode:Winning by Design — Jaco van der Kooij's demo methodology; Merel cites his video on keeping buyers engaged throughout a demoThe Maverick Selling Method — Brian Burns — top performers throw out the standard scriptSPIN Selling, MEDDIC, SPICED — frameworks Merel used to build custom GPTs for her team's discovery and coachingTrustPilot & Google Reviews — used by Merel to benchmark client performance and build compelling before/after storytellingGlassdoor — recommended for vetting a company's culture before accepting a roleConnect with Merel:⁠LinkedIn — Merel Roest⁠