This week’s article is a video. I was invited by Ricardo Okino, co-founder of Escola Exchange and one of the best sales team leaders I know, for a conversation about the relationship between sales teams and product teams.

Do salespeople have the pitch aligned with the product’s strategy? Are they, in fact, managing to make the customer see value in all the features? And what metrics should the Product and Sales teams keep an eye on to track market behavior and opportunities? What to do when the potential customer asks for a feature that the product does not have? Who is responsible for churn, sales or product?

These and other topics are what Okino and I talked about in this Exchange Masterclass. The video is in Portuguese and below there’s a transcription – made by AI – translated – also by an AI – into English.

Transcription:

Here’s the translated transcription of the videos conversation. The transcription was generated by Sonix, an AI tool for text transcription from audio or video. The translation was done by another AI, Google’s Translate. I didn’t revised neither the transcription nor the translation, so most certainly the text will contain some errors and weird sentences:

Okino: [00:00:01] Hey guys, how are you? Today we are going to start our masterclass and I have a very special guest and we take great care here in wanting to invite the best professional in the market to talk to us a little about product and sales. Why is this specifically? Because today being a good manager, a good sales leader, does not only involve knowing about sales. In fact, we have to be able to do this midfield very well with the other areas and have some of these skills and product. It is one of the most strategic areas of the company. And it is super important for us in this position to know how we can contribute to the product area and how which product can also help with the commercial area. So for that, guys, I’m going to open here, invite the biggest specialist in this in Brazil, which is Joaquim Torres. Welcome to Joca, the Change Masterclass and I’ll give you a minute to introduce yourself, so feel free to introduce yourself. The young staff.

Joca: [00:00:59] It’s really cool. Thanks for the invitation. Very nice to be here with you and the whole gang. Okay, there’s a long story there, but I’m going to make it very short so we have plenty of time to talk. I have been in the technology market for 30 years since my own startup, in the 90s, 92s, 93s, and I went through some internet providers. Then I spent 11 years at Locaweb, from Locaweb, I went to ContaAzul, where I met you, where we worked together with Conta Azul, I went to the INPS, I spent two years at the INPS. More recently, I faced a digital transformation head-on at a company whose core is sales, which is Lopes, Lopes, a company. Basically, her core business is selling and selling real estate. I spent two years there helping, leading the digital transformation. And then, more recently, in the middle of last year, I decided to leave that full time executive life and become a consultant, company advisor and do in-company training. And that’s what I’ve been doing more recently.

Okino: [00:02:07] Very good, very modest presentation. Joca, you are also the author of some books, right?

Joca: [00:02:12] Really? True. I wrote three books on product management writing the Fourth, now specifically on digital transformation. And that’s it. I have written a lot. I also really like writing.

Okino: [00:02:25] Very good! Wonder! So let’s go, Joca is always ours for our masterclass today, we prepared some very important questions here, which are the ones asked by almost every sales manager. I have this doubt and would like to have more information here on how we can solve it. Okay, let’s go. The main the first question I would like to ask you the following what in your view? Joca Both the product and sales areas have to have routines And how can we minimize the friction between areas to ensure that everyone is aligned in the right way?

Joca: [00:02:59] So, these two areas have to be close, but they need to understand that the nature of the conversation with the customer is different, right? While the sales area there, of course, is focused on understanding what the problem is, in short, finding the best solution there. But the sales area is focused on what is the best solution that exists within the company to be offered to the customer, to solve the customer’s problem, while the products area, in addition to understanding the problem and knowing if the product solves the problem is to find new problems to figure out how you are going to expand the product so that the product can solve these new problems and you eventually earn more, more market, have more things to sell.

Okino: [00:03:49] So it makes perfect sense. And that’s how you see, for example, the product strategies impacting the sales strategy. So how can we keep well connected what you envision as market expansion, what product envision with possible features, ticket and the type of commercial strategy?

Joca: [00:04:10] So I think you have to be very close, but it is a concern that you have to have. The sales team is usually a little anxious to be able to offer the solution to the customer right away. So you have to have some of that anxiety management. This is mainly the responsibility of the product manager there, to be able to present what, what is being done, what is being thought for the future. But it makes it clear to the sales team that this is still in the future, that it still shouldn’t be offered to the entire base, it shouldn’t be offered to new customers. So I think there has to be this relationship of trust and understanding what already has to be sold versus what, what is in the pipeline, what is being developed at the moment and what lies ahead. And this communication, it needs to be very fluid between the two so as not to generate friction. Eventually, the sales person will go there and offer something that doesn’t exist yet, it’s not ready yet. Several times I’ve seen this problem happen.

Joca: [00:05:16] So you have to have this communication very clear. I’ve seen people talking and I’m not in favor of it. You’re talking about no, I don’t tell the sales team what’s ahead, because otherwise the sales team will sell, right? No, the sales team is not there either. On the contrary, the sales team has to be a partner for the products area there, bringing more insights about the customer. After all, the sales team breathes, the customer breathes their problems. So I’m not in favor of that, but obviously you have to manage some of that anxiety. You, who are very much in the sales world, know this anxiety. Wow, but you go to work, do you let me talk to the customer? No, not secure, make communication a little more structured, see the right moment to communicate, eventually do a test with one or two customers before offering it to the entire base of something that is still being developed. Anyway, there are strategies and strategies for him, for this, this work.

Okino: [00:06:13] Over there. And you said that, since I remembered how, as a salesperson, I already went through some companies that this product roadmap was very transparent. I can tell you something like this, your view about being transparent about this makes perfect sense, right? Because the seller already has it. It is a natural challenge, obviously, for us to be able to have a lot of authority in front of the founder of a company or in front of an executive group as a salesperson. So, when the seller is empowered, with some information, for example, roadmap or business visions, he manages to position himself better, because even if he is not going to sell that at the time, he can say the following speech Look at our vision as company. That’s it, we have a vision in terms of the product being this, that, that, and it is already starting to prepare the ground for eventually, in the future, having the customer already know what are the possible deals that he will be able to do with the company. So it’s basically preparing the ground for a possibility of future upsell or crosser, right? Does that make sense to you?

Joca: [00:07:20] So without a doubt I think it’s a very powerful tool for the sales person there for you. Eventually the product as it is. No, it doesn’t answer. If the sales person understands what is ahead, he can even go ahead and say look, he cannot sell, obviously, because it is not being developed, but he can go ahead and say look, our team over there is working on it, there is a clarity of that this is important. We’re going to get to that point and I’d really like to be closer. Eventually I can talk to my product team, bring you in to test and if you think it makes sense, then you can create a really, really interesting approach speech. I think it’s such a powerful tool.

Okino: [00:08:02] It’s cool, really good. Tell me something, you said this usually happens sometimes too. I know it’s not a rule, on the contrary, it ends up being an exception for the seller to end up selling something that doesn’t exist. But from the moment we see that you have new products, new features, can you imagine some companies that have many, many products or a very wide range of options? How can that product help sales there? How do you guarantee that everyone is well aligned and well trained regarding the value proposition of what the product solves? That doesn’t solve what he does, that he doesn’t do? How can the product contribute to all this in your view?

Joca: [00:08:45] I will bring a third element here in our conversation, which is that we are talking about the product. Product management, product development and sales. But I will bring up a third element that is fundamental for what I call defining and executing the goal-to-market strategy, which is exactly this strategy of how to take it to the market, which is the function of product marketing. It is a function that is not very well known in Brazil, but I think it is essential, especially in any type of product, but especially in technology products. And why does this person do it? What is her role? While the product person. It is concerned with developing the right product, that is, the product that solves the customer’s problems while achieving the company’s goals. The product marketing person is responsible for telling the external and internal world about the product and the problem it solves, externally and, obviously, potential customers and existing customers. And internal is the whole company, especially the sales area, that is, preparing the sales area, explaining the product, explaining the sales arguments, explaining. Look, this is the problem that we customers usually have and our product is very good at solving this problem because of that. Anyway, all this speech is a responsibility of this product marketing function that sometimes ends up falling on top of the product management person. But a little more modern companies are having a prominent role, that’s why it’s in the marketing area, reporting to the board. Anyway. VP of Marketing So that would be the strategy. One of the roles in this de goal to market strategy, right? We end up using a lot of English terms, but anyway, it’s what they call without enabled, which is nothing more than enabling the sales team to start selling that product. And one of the main functions of this strategy is to take a product to the market.

Okino: [00:10:49] Look how cool! So, oh heavens! Undeniably a moment of existential crisis, because from then on I know that it is a position that ends up being within some sales areas. That’s what we’re talking about here. Perhaps it can be even more connected with a product itself, a product function that does the. In general. And that.

Joca: [00:11:09] That’s it. In fact, it wouldn’t even become a product, but it would be in the middle, which is in the marketing area that the marketing area has this role of telling the external and internal world. And then comes the internal use of the product and the problem it solves, right? So he would be there in the marketing area, close to both the product and sales, but in the middle there pulls me.

Okino: [00:11:34] Interesting. Very good! And what do you think, Joca? Asking yourself a question now, thinking that it ends up being a way for many companies, avoiding it, maybe trying to slow down, slow down a little the salesperson’s momentum of putting the salesperson’s goal with churn to, for example. So, it’s not enough for you to sell, but you also have a minimum churn rate that makes up your commission or makes up your deliverables for sales every month or every quarter, and so on. What do you think about having this methodology of. To cause a penalty for the seller if he has a very high churn? What is your view on this?

Joca: [00:12:18] So I think it might make sense if we talk about being so premature. Then I think it might make sense. Now, if we talk about chance in general, no. Because the premature cry is the one that happens in the first month, at most in the second month, which shows that eventually, the sale that was made was not the best fit, the best fit between the problem that the customer had and the product that the people are selling. So yeah, that’s my main role of the person selling. It means understanding the customer’s problem well and understanding whether the customer’s problem is solved by our product. It’s talking, look, our product solves this problem very well. So, I see this fit as one of the main roles of the salesperson. It is when this fit is not done well, that is, when there is a bar force. Look, you have a problem like, like, with our product, it does something else, but if you push the bar a little, it can solve it. Then the customer enters. Ana believes in this possibility, Go there, buy it, then after two months he cancels. This is a premature team, which I call one, two months later he cancels a premature team. It means that the fit was not well done. And then this penalty can make sense. After that, the responsibility of the product person’s timing is whether they are solving the problem, whether they continue to engage, or whether the customer’s need has changed or whether the customer’s need has changed. Did the product need to evolve or did it not evolve? You can. It might not be a product error, it might be a strategic decision. The customer evolved to need X, but the product’s strategic decision was to go in the Y direction. It will have rained and then the responsibility is a strategic decision that was. It has nothing to do with the sales team. So I think if it’s premature, first the second month, fine. Going forward, I don’t think so. It doesn’t make as much sense.

Okino: [00:14:15] Or does it make sense? So the tip here is mainly to look at aligning expectations. It would eventually penalize the churn it in the first month, in the second month, even the third month, depending on the client’s implementation process. But from then on, the impact really ends up being much more the product solution than closing the seller, which makes a lot of sense. From the good point and a next question here. Joca, what are the sales metrics that you notice that the product team cannot lose sight of? And let me complement this question a little bit. I think a lot about work metrics. Yes I work. Eventually results that are important for the product team to also look more at who is in the area. In the commercial area, there is a lot of sales, we are at the forefront. So there are a lot of objections from the customer regarding the product and regarding the price and so on. So they end up saying it’s too expensive, This is missing if you don’t do this or that. There is a lot of information that the sales team is also in doubt about how to present this type of report without seeming like an excuse like I didn’t sell because I don’t have this or that. But it’s very relevant information, right? So, in your opinion, what are the important metrics and perhaps important KPIs that we can take from sales by product team that contribute to the evolution of the product as a whole?

Joca: [00:15:45] I think you said well what I think is this funnel, contacts made, interest and such. Seeing how qualified the leads really are are likes that make sense for the product, right? And then the path there inside the funnel until it closes or not, is what goes out, which are the objections. I think objections are super important, right? Of course, anyway, each one of them has to look at with some attention. Eventually, what the customer is asking for is not in the product vision, it is outside the product vision, the product strategy or, eventually, the pricing issue. Thus, the customer will always ask for something cheaper, but if you are selling at that price, it means that there are people willing to pay that price. If you’re selling nothing or very little and the objection is too big. It really is a matter of evaluating price and then there is a market analysis, in short, there is a whole work to be done in relation to price. But hey, all this information is essential there to understand, to understand the product and this information well. They are important for the product management person who is there developing the product and for this other function here, which sometimes the product person takes over, but sometimes there is a separate person, which is product marketing, right? So, eventually, pricing Product marketing can do a competition analysis, understand how the competitors are doing, how is our price in relation to the competitors, wow, our positioning in relation to the competitors and then build a pitch better, help the sales team to have a better speech, justifying the price or eventually say it yourself. But they are, they are, they are essential inputs, essential because they are cool.

Okino: [00:17:35] So I think it’s a really important thing to be able to map the reasons for objection well and bring this to the product very clearly. Yes, if it’s a feature problem, what was the features? Was it a price plan? What was the price of even a competitor for those who lost, right? I think the good stuff is relevant to help with mapping.

Joca: [00:17:53] I think it’s very important to have this mapping very clear there, right? There is always that doubt whether the client will open 100% of the objection to us. Sometimes it doesn’t open, but as much as he can open there, it’s always important to bring and, finally, do a job of tabulating the data. You’re also a pretty analytical guy, like me, so if you do a good job of tabulating the data and trying to find a pattern there, I think that’s super, super important.

Okino: [00:18:24] And eventually there are some discussions like why did you have the objection? Was expensive? Lost by price? Was it in fact the product that did not deliver? Or was it the seller who didn’t know how to sell value? Have you ever been through this kind of product and sales discussion?

Joca: [00:18:44] Without a doubt, there’s always this, this, this doubt. Damn! And then comes that work of looking a little at the market, seeing how you are positioned in relation to competitors with whom, who deliver more or less similar value and have. I also understood your speech there, in that conversation of seeing the way in which the seller is presenting the product, he is really praising everything that the product has, right? Sometimes I see that it is not the seller’s responsibility, but sometimes I see a seller who ends up getting a lot of no, so he ends up getting a little unmotivated and he ends up losing that faith, that desire there, that twinkle in his eyes to talk. The product has already taken four, five. Nobody wants this product here, I’m going to offer it here, but I already know I’m going to take it. No. So I think there is also a job to review the pitch to help the seller see the positive points that the product has. One thing that’s cool, that I think can help, even in this regard, is to bring testimonials from existing customers who are happy telling Poxa, what problem does it solve? How do you solve it well? Resolve with satisfied with the solution? Because this again helps to bring this clarity of the value that the product delivers and even helps to build a better pitch, to build a better sales pitch.

Okino: [00:20:15] I think it’s cool that you see that there’s a lot of synergy. Even so, from the sales techniques that we use as product positioning, triggers, social proof, everything. I think this is super important. Very good. And even in this line, a question needs to be asked, which is the following: how is the product strategy? Does it interfere with communication, product positioning and that ends up reflecting there in marketing communication and even in sales communication? How does product strategy positioning interfere with these other areas?

Joca: [00:20:52] It’s super important, because when someone is working on a product they love, what is their job? What is the primary role of a product person? It has to connect the company’s objectives there, which is what the company expects from that product with the customer’s problems and needs. This is where the product is born. Based on available technology, he builds a product that achieves the company’s goals while solving the customer’s problems and needs. So, this clarity of what the problems are and what the customer’s needs are is fundamental in the conception of the product. This needs to be clear to marketing. It needs to be clear to people that it is clear to everyone what the problem is that we solve first. There are a lot of people and this is an important point. A lot of people make the sales pitch on top of the product. Look what an amazing product! Look what I have here. Look at functionality, functionality B, functionality C, right? And you have to take a step before, because the product was actually born to solve a problem. So, the first point is to be clear about this problem, the problem it solves, right? From the moment, have this clarity of this problem. And then the whole company has to be clear and especially the product, marketing and sales team needs to be clear about this problem to know how to approach people who have this problem, how to identify that the person has this problem. The conversation has to leave the problem that you have this type of problem, how, how does it work, how do you solve this today so you can take and present your, your solution, what is your product? And there? And then the sale tends to happen in a slightly more fluid way.

Okino: [00:22:30] Today you are an animal, yes, yes, I know, I know, I have already experienced mentoring processes, also some companies that still did a demonstration process, as if it were a process of letting them teach everything that my product does, right? I once got to Joca to say that a company had a relatively low average ticket of 400 R$ per month and they took 1:00 am to make a demo, 1:00 am because in the conversation a point to point of everything the product did. And then you see, right? That’s not what sells. I think that people who study sales already know that it’s not a product, that it’s not going to sell specifically the product, but the pain that you solve. And what are you talking about too? That the product is developed based on this study, on the problem it solves, not on the basis of a feature.

Joca: [00:23:20] Exactly, exactly. It’s the pain that solves it, right? Including this until a strong discussion there in the product world. Because actually, although we talk about the product product world, it is a vehicle. In fact, what we are there for is to solve a problem. The product we make can be an app, it can be a website, it can be an SMS notification. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a product. We need to solve the customer’s problem. We are here and we are paid and remunerated by our client to solve his problem.

Okino: [00:23:53] Total good. Very good, since since asking something you started talking about it. I recently started studying the Jobs to be Done methodology. People, who are in the commercial area, talk a lot nowadays about AD ICP. The Customer Profile is very much based on sometimes taking a slice of the market, and then some commercial teams that are a little more robust already talk a little more about personas, but little is said about it yet. I don’t think it’s even spoken. In truth. Still on Jobs to BE Done in the commercial area, although we use these methodologies rather than SPIN Selling or GPC T or, in short, n question methodologies. Little is said about Jobs’ methodology. Chubby Dan. You can make some contribution if the sales people with regards to the mythos of Tibi Jobs, Dane or how that eventually the products. They are built around this methodology and how it can help sales.

Joca: [00:24:53] Very cool! Very cool, this thing with young people that is a tool again like ICEP, like persona, everything is a tool. So it’s important to know the tool and find out if it makes sense to use the young woman, basically studying what she is, what she recommends, what she says, that people hire a product to solve, one to do a job, to solve a certain problem. That’s why it’s chubby duh games. A job to be done. People hire a product as if they were hiring a single person. Instead of hiring a person, they hire a product to do a certain job and then it’s our responsibility to find out what that job is. It’s the same thing to discover the problem, only looking at it from another way, right? So, this thing of discovering the work for which the product was hired, I think it also helps a lot, in the sales pitch, to do it again. Going back to what we were talking about at the beginning, What does sales do? It makes the fit between a need here, a customer problem and what we have to solve there. So YouTube goes a lot along those lines. You ask a series of questions to understand not only the problem, but hey, why would he buy the product? Which? Which? What work would the product do for him? It could be, I don’t know, organizing sales prospecting data with a CRM, right? So the job to be dan is to organize the sales funnel. This and this, this is the job. You see that on YouTube there is a verb, right? Always organize the sales funnel, I don’t know, think about the benefit like feet and provide a benefit of well-being, of physical activity for the workforce. So you are hiring tips to provide this benefit. There’s always a verb there. So understand this verb what? What work is being hired there from the solution?

Okino: [00:27:04] Well, I found this, animal man, that’s a lot for me. In my view, it’s almost gold for the sales area like this. So has the person watching your company done any Jobs work yet? I had mine. It’s a sensational job, almost essential for the commercial area, because, as I was saying, it’s also a methodology, it’s a methodology, a way of doing work to find out what the customer is looking for, what the customer wants to solve after all. And he goes from beginning to end, right? I think that from the moment he realizes a problem he has, to the way he wants to solve it and how he wants to feel and what he wants to have there in the end.

Joca: [00:27:44] So we can do it.

Okino: [00:27:45] If you sell, study this process well too, how the product was created, how it was researched to be born that way. Talking about those problems, it gives the seller an absurd amount of strength to know how it will impact the customer’s life.

Joca: [00:28:02] So I will, without a doubt, if the sales people can have access to the product there. We call this process the Discovery process, finding out about the problem there that will be solved. Then find out about the problem and discover solutions, possible solutions. It is a process that happens before making the product itself. If the sales person there, the sales team has access to what happened there in that Discovery phase, that is certainly a very rich input there to help build this piece, this speech, this entire offer there by the sales team.

Okino: [00:28:40] Angry. Very good. Well, I have to ask you one more thing here, Joca, that when I started doing this objectivity work, I was fascinated by the product area. I even took some product courses, everything. I’m a big fan of the theme. Have you noticed Joca like this or have you already seen sales professionals migrating to the product area? If you’ve experienced this scenario? And if yes or no, what are the career tips you give to those who are making this transition? What essentially changes from a person who is in today’s role, from commercial leadership to one for a product area?

Joca: [00:29:21] Cool, cool. I’ve seen, I’ve seen, some people making this transition. And it makes a lot of sense, because it’s one thing for you to be up front offering a ready-made solution, it’s another thing for you to go a little further back in this process and work on designing that solution. Deep down, deep down, the two touch on the same thing, which is understanding the customer’s problem, but the way you address this problem and solve this problem, or, in short, meet this need. She is different, while the seller has to work. There was a friend of mine who spoke the term in English, but translated from Portuguese What’s the truck? What’s in the truck? The sales person works with what’s in the truck, he just has to sell what’s there. The product person has this freedom to be able to devise new solutions to existing problems. So yes it makes sense. Even there in Lopes, there were people who made this, this migration. Bruno who worked closely with you. His background was entirely in sales. There he was in sales, then he moved to the franchising area and then he made this career transition to the products area and found himself in the products area. Happy of life. Do you want to continue the products area? So that’s cool man.

Okino: [00:30:44] It’s been shared in some stories. Your vision is about that too, but it pays off, right? Talking a little about Back to BI Cameli, who is my partner, she has a very similar product culture. Maybe she doesn’t even know it, but she has a very strong product culture for MTB, which I find super interesting. And it starts from a premise that seems to make a lot of sense to me, which is the following guy, it doesn’t matter much, our ideas don’t matter, if you want to make a product like this, like this, it doesn’t matter. Let me see what the market wants, right? So today, our B2B products that we offer, the market, B2B solutions, practically all of them, she validated 1A1 in all the prospecting she carried out. So she spoke with the company and began to understand how he wanted it to be resolved, how he imagined solving the problem. And in this way, we created three lines of service that were the flagship for us in the last two years. Basically, the bi to bi roadmap was made, it was led by the commercial point of view. What is the standard that exists, for example, in hiring in-company training or the standard that exists for hiring mentorships, which is a model that we work with, that sticks well. This is common to happen in your view with COBIT BI, where you have the commercial, sometimes leading Discovery initiatives, perhaps with more strategic accounts or with large accounts. What’s your vision?

Joca: [00:32:18] Do you have it? No, it sure does. I am now walking that same path. And today, as I am an individual entrepreneur, in English, the fancy word is solo predator. That was the two individual. I’m, I’m, I’m having to do all the sales and stuff. I even take mentorship with you to improve my sales part a little, but I’ve been feeling exactly that. Sometimes I get there to talk to a potential client there and he brings me a series of questions Well, I hadn’t thought of solving it that way, but maybe it makes sense. That’s how my training and Company were born, which I do too. Training in Company was born from a customer request. I didn’t initially. Then he said No, but we needed to train here. I said let’s not go, because I already had a lecture at Company, but I had no training, no. We’re going to do a talk here and I think that’s more than enough. The rest you will watch in a pre-recorded class and such. Then he said No, I want training in purchasing, I want it, I want it. Then I went there, I’m going to make the proposal here, I made the proposal, he agreed, accepted the proposal, I went there and did the training. And from the moment I was offering the training, I began to understand what he was really looking for, the interaction he needed in that in-company training. So there’s a lot of that. In this sales process comes many, many insights, of interesting things to bring into the product, to bring into the roadmap and without a doubt is quite relevant.

Joca: [00:33:51] Now going to the counterpoint. That’s it, obviously, for companies that are reasonably small here, like an exchange, how? Like my company. We have that flexibility. When you start to get a little bigger, you have a very large customer base, you serve, I don’t know, 1000 customers, 2000 bi-to-bi customers. You start to have less flexibility to pull a product out of the hat just from the conversation, right? So what happens in a situation like this? The product team why what happens? B and B will always have an exception, there will always be a different demand. The larger the customer, the higher the exception level. Imagine, I don’t know, closing an account like, I don’t know, Itaú, right? Man, the guys are huge, you will, you will want to be flexible in some way to bring him to your, to your wallet, there. So the product team, what does it have to think? He has to think that exceptions are part of the product, right? And then he has to think of the product as being flexible enough to absorb these exceptions, without being too big a disruption to the roadmap. How is this done? Then? I’ll give you an example, which is SAP. SAP is a company that sells bit bi and bi to bi software. Large accounts, how did they make it flexible, accept exceptions. The first was to slice the product into modules. So you sell SAP, different modules and people buy the modules that make sense for them.

Joca: [00:35:29] The second way is through customization. You can customize the product a lot when you are installing the product, to the point that SAP has created a programming language that is ABAP that allows extreme customization of WhatsApp. And the third one is through integrations, integrations via API, integrations via file exchange. This we used a lot there on the same day of the play. We had to integrate with gym management systems and on the other side, with HR systems. And the integrations were all either through API in the gym system, or through API or file exchange in the HR system. So it’s just the three ways that we make it flexible. So this flexibility work that you are working on in Bixby, especially in BID to be Enterprise, is something that has to be part of the product, right? This is something that, if not well thought out, ends up generating such friction, because I see it and know that there are customers there, that we have to find a way to accommodate, right? On the other side of the product, it’s that rigid thing, no, I can’t make it more flexible, I’m a scale product, so there’s no way. As you are in the Bit Bixby Enterprise world, the product team has to think about how to product, use the exception, bring that flexibility. As for the core, which was something that SAP has already solved, well, several other companies. Salesforce is also super flexible, it has a programming language too. So this way of thinking about the bi to bi enterprise and the flexibility demanded by them.

Okino: [00:36:56] Animal So basically yes, what you’re talking about is natural. How much? The bigger the ticket. When we are talking about enterprise sales, the customer will want customizations, everything and so on. There’s not much to get away from it. He has a special demand, it’s his and sales have to learn to adapt to that too. Sometimes there are even technical entrepreneurs who go along there to do all the follow-up. And in terms of products, products for Enterprise, they also have to have this flexibility to absorb this demand, right? But this applies to Enterprise businesses. So when we’re talking about the average, the average business, I don’t know, I can consider that a SM bi of up to 250,000 R$ a year, maybe.

Joca: [00:37:38] I think that’s it.

Okino: [00:37:40] Yes, there is a range, above about 100 billion there, up to 50,000 R$ a year, maybe a cut of 50, 50,000 R$ a year, right? No, it doesn’t make much sense for you to have an excess of customizations and such. I think that service like in this case could still happen, but the product itself ends up being a little complicated, right?

Joca: [00:38:00] This is more flexible, right? But more product. For example, that of Impress. It only had 2000 customers when I got there alone and a huge base. But the customers were customers of 1000 employees, preferably over 5000 employees. So they were big companies, right? So there’s no way, there’s a job there Enterprise. When we look at the scenario that we lived there together, there in the blue account, the Blue account, we are talking about a company or sometimes it is an owner or at most there are five, ten employees there in small companies and consequently, my ticket there was a small ticket, of 100, 150, 200 R$. I can’t make a product like this flexible, whereas at Impress I’m talking about one thing, a huge base of employees there, big companies that paid a big ticket. Then I have to be more flexible.

Okino: [00:38:51] Animal. The animal. Joca, I’m going to ask you one last question before closing with you here, which is the following: we have a dilemma and a dilemma. In fact, it’s almost a bedside phrase that we always say that is the following: management is done with numbers, but results are achieved with people. So, from our point of view, it’s expensive, if you’re not looking, you’re not managing. If you don’t have a number, you don’t manage. You don’t know exactly how it works. Now, it is not necessarily that you have a number that you will be able to engage people and bring results. This is a maxim. We work a lot, which is what he does in our training and beyond. And working with you, some projects too. And one thing that calls my attention is what you built from the product vision. You seem to have made more sense of everything. For everything you were building, it reinforced a lot that you wanted to know a little bit about it, about what your product vision usually is and how it can eventually help sales. Because you stop having just that number like you have to sell, sell, sell, sell billing, billing, billing. And you focus on this vision, which I think is totally aspirational, right? So maybe you could give a tip to those who don’t have it. And it’s what you do and how you use it as a strategy, okay?

Joca: [00:40:13] It’s not cool, is it? Well, that’s it. But I loved the phrase, inclusive. But that’s exactly what it is. I am also passionate about numbers. As you know, I do a lot of this management, monitoring the results. There you see the numbers, We have a problem, there is a number that shows this problem, how it is happening, even for us to see if we are going to invest, if this number will actually improve. An indicator that clearly shows that we are making progress, but just numbers are not enough for us to actually achieve the result. We need to be clear about where we want to go, what is our purpose, why are we here, what? What do we do. Then? This thing about the purpose, the vision, the purpose is why we are here, the vision and where we want to go. What do we want to be, when, when to grow as a company or as a product, and so on. So, having this clarity is essential to inspire the team, the entire team. In the places where I went, I always tried to have that. Clear. If I didn’t have it, I found a way to look for it, create it, make it clear, right? And that helps a lot, including discussions about what to do with the product, about a demand that comes from the customer there through the sales team.

Joca: [00:41:32] And then that conversation, given our vision, how does it make sense? Does it fit? How does it fit in with our vision here? How does it fit into our strategy? The strategy is nothing more than the way for us to reach the vision. How does it fit here in our strategy for us to reach this vision? So it leaves this background, it makes people more engaged. Two It’s clear where everyone is there, everyone is paddling in the same direction. E three She makes all everyday conversations much more, much more objective, much more to the point. And it doesn’t stay in that guesswork, because the customer yelled that, not because the Customer Success people there brought this complaint. It’s not a well-directed thing, we know where we want to go, right? I remember, even in the Azul account, I presented this vision there in the onboarding of every employee and then the feedback we received was Caramba, how clear is what the Azul account is building, so this helps a lot to have this clarity. Enter the company and everyone has this clarity. We are building it here. This is our purpose, this is our reason for existing. That’s what we’re doing.

Okino: [00:42:47] Yeah, I remember that in sales, bringing the salesperson’s counterpoint there, it got there to my area. People already arrived with a very strong footprint. No, not just bringing new clients, but helping the entrepreneur, helping the small entrepreneur, helping him to get things off paper and start having efficient management, helping the accountant’s life, helping other people. So we ended up buying much more the purpose, perhaps the mission of what the company causes in society that it inspires than effectively just a number, right? Very good, Excellent, Joca, since I wanted to thank you to all the audience that we are also watching this masterclass. João, who is the greatest product specialist in the Brazilian market, author of four books going into the fifth, right, Joca?

Joca: [00:43:36] And the third.

Okino: [00:43:38] Going to the room. He is like a lot less. Who wrote four books here? You’re welcome. And well, I wanted to give you Joca’s final words for you too. If you have any tips, some final consideration here for folks. And also to talk a little about the work you do for companies. For anyone interested.

Joca: [00:43:57] It’s really cool, really cool. Thank you for the invitation here is very nice. I think this internet thing is fundamental to clarify this relationship, this relationship and this partnership between the sales area and the product area. I think they are very synergistic. There’s a lot you can and should do together, so I really appreciate the space. It’s really nice to be here, I think there’s room in the community in general for us to improve this relationship even more and get more out of working together, all in the same direction. We had the opportunity to work together there at Ponta Azul. We experienced a little of that there in our moment, hands on there, then at Lopes too. When we called you to help us with sales, then I think there is still a lot to grow at this table, in this contact. And I thank you very much for the invitation and I make myself available. Anyway, today I’ve been working a lot on mentoring, product, helping product teams create better products, products that actually solve the customer’s problem. While helping to reach the numbers and results that we always have to achieve. I’ve been doing in-company training as well, so I’m totally available if you think it makes sense to take it to your company or whoever is listening, then I’m totally available. I’d love to hear more of your problems and opportunities in the product space.

Okino: [00:45:33] Very good, since he’s a very modest guy. But he does the digital transformation and that of several companies, from the most traditional to the most innovative, and he also has open courses at the docks. It immerses geocachers and product vision building, which are super relevant topics for anyone, for every entrepreneur and for every director who wants to go deeper and deeper into these skills, both product and cross-area skills that end up helping everyone.

Joca: [00:46:02] And that is.

Okino: [00:46:02] Excellent. Play, thank you very much. It was a pleasure having you here with us. I wish you much success and for those who want to add Joca here on LinkedIn, Joaquim Torres, play.

Joca: [00:46:13] This right here, just look there. Joaquim Torres If you put Joaquim Torres in, Joca falls face down there, put all three, said Maravilha!

Okino: [00:46:21] Thank you very much. See you. So, both for you and the staff. And I hope I can have new episodes there with you too, Joca.

Joca: [00:46:29] Ball show! Thanks for the invitation. I.

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