EPISODE 74

Salesforce’s VP of Competitive Intelligence, Dan Hamilton | CE Show on the Road

Dan Hamilton is the Vice President of Competitive Intelligence at Salesforce. He and Adam met up at SCIP IntelliCon in Scottsdale to talk about how his team drives tangible impact across the organization.

Everyone knows CRM data is messy — do something about it

A problem isn’t a problem until you see and feel the impact of it. We all know CRM data can be unwieldy and messy. But do the right people understand just how negative the impact of that messy data can be?

Your job as a compete pro is to show that impact to the senior leaders who can make change happen. Dan Hamilton does this by comparing the dirty CRM data to other, more reliable data to show the delta between the two.

And when unreliable intel or data works its way into your deal cycle, you could be missing out on winnable deals.

“That’s where the competitive revenue gap stuff comes in. A couple points in your win rate can make or break your quarter.”

A herculean task like cleaning up CRM data can’t be done by one individual — you’ll need buy-in from senior leaders.

But you can be a catalyst for positive change by demonstrating the impact of the problem and creating urgency towards finding a solution.

the competitive revenue gap is the revenue lost to competitors that you should have won

It’s all about focus; it’s all about impact

When Dan and Adam chatted at last year’s IntelliCon, the Salesforce team’s MO was focus and impact. A year later, the more things change the more they stay the same.

No matter how hectic or serene the economic climate might be at the time, Dan’s team always prioritizes the areas of focus where they can have the most impact.

“We draw a very clear line and say (…) these are the things that we can prioritize because we’re going to deliver the most impact.”

There are hundreds of ways a compete team provides value — dozens of different projects Dan and team could jump in on.

But your best bet is to get granular about it all. Identify the areas of the business where you’ll have the most obvious and most consequential impact, and focus on those.

Hear Dan and other CI professionals chat it up with Adam at last year’s SCIP IntelliCon

Get involved in deals you need to win today

The strategic versus tactical push-pull will never go away. Let the market should determine which of those get the lion’s share of your time and effort.

“You can sit back and do all these academic things when things are great because you’ve got the time to do it. But in today’s market, we have to win deals now.”

The Salesforce compete team makes their bones on doing just that — supporting their sales teams to help win deals now.

And support doesn’t just mean pointing the rep towards a battlecard. It’s about taking a 360 view of the market landscape, understanding the customer, and then working with a sales rep to close deals.

It’s Dan’s favourite part of the job. Maybe that’s why he — and his team — is so damn good at it.

your competitive revenue gap is the revenue lost to competitors that you should have won
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