In the latest episode of the Private Equity Funcast, Operating Partners Cici Zheng and Paul Stansik discuss the ICP - Ideal Customer Profile. As investors, we're frequently asking our portfolio companies - who is your ICP? Which ones are your best-fit customers, the ones that your product is truly the best fit for to solve their pain points? How do we avoid trying to be the dreaded "swiss-army knife" and being everything to everybody? In this episode we discuss why defining an ICP is important to us and our 3 step process for building out an ICP. 

No prospect is going to buy enterprise software on impulse.  Prospects don't need advertising, they need help, help understanding that they have a problem, help in understanding their options for solving that problem, and help in working their way through an evaluation and choosing a solution.  Paul Stansik talks with Marcus Sheridan, author of "They Ask, You Answer" about these topics and more.

On this episode of the Funcast, Operating Partner Paul Stansik is joined by CEO Elias Rubel, whose team at Matter Made works with B2B marketing teams big and small to help accelerate their revenue growth. If you've ever wondered how to organize a marketing team, the right way to interview a marketing leader, the foundation you need in place to launch an effective demand generation campaign, or what leaders of companies like Loom, G2, Dropbox, and other unicorns are doing to tune their inbound lead machines, this one is for you. 

Sometimes the recipe for a good discussion is to simply pick an important topic, invite two smart people who disagree with each other, and then sit back and listen. Today Paul Stansik, Operating Partner at ParkerGale, is joined by Cory Bray (MD at ClozeLoop) and Nelson Gilliat (Author of Death of the SDR: And the Birth of Buyer Centric Revenue) to talk about how to get prospecting and growth right. In the course of a rousing hourlong debate, Paul, Cory, and Nelson cover the spectrum of opinions on “how to prospect well”, the evolving role of the BDR/SDR, and where sales and marketing teams should focus to maximize their chances for success.

In this week's episode, we are talking with Pam Lang, CEO of Xcelerated Data, a company that focuses on fixing data quality problems leading to better decisions in your marketing organization.   Pam explains compiled lists, hotlists, the differences between consumer lists and business lists, and SIC codes versus NAICS codes.  

ParkerGale Operating Principal Paul Stansik is joined by Zorian Rotenberg, former head of Sales, CRO, and now a PE growth advisor. Zorian and Paul share their approach to diagnosing and addressing typical growth problems, how sales teams can use simple math to set better pipeline targets, and what sets great CROs apart.

Operating Principals Cici Zheng and Paul Stansik are joined by the founders of ClozeLoop and authors of some of our favorite books on sales training and management - Cory Bray and Hilmon Sorey. Hilmon and Cory share their views on where most sales training falls short, the importance of uncovering customer pain, and how we work together to assess, train, and enable our portfolio company sales teams.