How Sendlane Grew Its Sales Team 10x and Generated $3.7 Million in Pipeline in Just 6 Months

The Challenge

Sendlane is a fast-growing email & SMS marketing automation platform for eCommerce brands. Keegan Otter, Director of Sales and Rev Ops was brought on at the end of Q1 2022 to build a growth strategy and enablement program in an effort to scale the organization’s revenue teams. 

When he started, Sendlane only had two account executives, no BDRs, and no sales enablement process in place. With such aggressive growth goals to 10x their team, Keegan needed a way to centralize information and efficiently share processes and training materials with the upcoming sales class. He had used the knowledge management system (KMS) Guru at past companies, but once he demoed Spekit’s Just-in-time learning platform, he was blown away by the ability to embed enablement content directly into applications reps use most for what he calls “proactive enablement.” Meaning instead of directing new sellers to another solution such as Guru for enablement content, Keegan could bring relevant content into a rep’s flow of work with Spekit, increasing productivity and decreasing ramp time.

If you want to go from a reactive to a proactive approach to enablement, Spekit is the tool you need. Spekit is leading the way for proactive enablement by living in the tools reps use every day

Keegan Otter, Director of Sales and Rev Ops at Sendlane

The Solution

“With Spekit, we were able to grow our sales team from 2 to 20 in just 6 months. Plus, we’ve generated $3.7 million in pipeline and have already closed three quarters of a million in that timeframe because we’ve been able to ramp up reps so fast.”

Keegan Otter, Director of Sales and Rev Ops at Sendlane

Keegan was able to easily import all of his training content into Spekit and roll it out to all of Sendlane’s revenue teams in less than a week. Now, instead of wasting time searching through Google Drive folders or messy documentation, reps can view Sendlane’s “rules of engagement” through embedded Speks, or bite-sized, contexual pieces of information, that live in the tools they already use. 

Sendlane’s tech stack is extensive and growing. Spekit is already being used in 12+ tools such as Outreach, Hubspot, Seamless, BuiltWith, and Store Leads with plans to roll out 4 more in the next quarter. Reps can simply hover over the Spekit icon to surface high-level tool processes like how to build an Outreach sequence or best practices such as revenue attribution, in a matter of seconds.

With Spekit, the need for extensive training sessions is eliminated. Instead of creating a Loom video or posting information in Slack only to get lost, team experts quickly create Speks so everyone has the most up-to date- information available at their fingertips. In Keegan’s past experiences, it took reps around 45 days to grasp a new tool – with Spekit, it only takes two weeks.

“Having Spekit is a confidence boost for the entire organization. In fact, in our last eNPS scoring, we ranked the highest for providing the resources and knowledge employees need to perform at their job.”

Keegan Otter, Director of Sales and Rev Ops at Sendlane

Not only does Spekit save Keegan and other managers time, but it has boosted the confidence of sellers. Instead of asking managers questions, reps are encouraged to check Spekit first, leading to more productive teams, and saving managers time to focus on more strategic priorities. 

The Results

“Spekit reduced the rollout period for new tools, processes, and changes. Therefore, we were able to decrease the time to close and increase revenue.”

Keegan Otter, Director of Sales and Rev Ops at Sendlane

With a combination of sophisticated processes and Spekit, Keegan was able to build out an entire BDR team and enablement program for account executives and managers. Not only did he secure his promotion from Manager to Director in roughly 6 months after his start date, Keegan helped Sendlane:

• Grow from no BDRs and two AEs to a 20 person sales team
• Generate $3.7 million in pipeline and close three quarters of a million dollars in revenue
• Cut BDR ramp time from 90-120 days to just 65
• Sustain a 88% BDR retention rate 
• Almost completely eliminate repetitive enablement-based questions
• Save enablement and revenue ops leaders 3 hours per week on training managers
• Save sales reps 2 hours a day searching for answers and process information

Because of the success of the enablement program, Sendlane has plans to triple in size in the next six months and bring on a full-time enablement manager.