The Bravado Pod

Using Psychology to Scale GTM to $100M with Tomer Chernia, SVP Sales at Vercel

The best sales people understand the psychology of sales… and the best sales leaders understand the psychology of leading a successful GTM organization. Tomer Chernia, SVP Sales at Vercel has mastered both.  In this episode, he takes us through his sales and leadership strategy, which scaled Vercel to $100M ARR at breakneck speed.  - The key to sales outreach that unlocks every buyer profile and market segment  - Vercel’s unique mock pitch process uncovers what hiring managers really want to see - Reconciling team morale with the board’s demands to conquer higher revenue targets Episode Content: 00:00 - Introducing Tomer Chernia, SVP Sales @ Vercel 04:00 - From Selling MarTech to Open Source DevTools 07:04 - Selling and Outreach to the Open Source Community 13:42 - Splitting up Territories and Deal Complexity 19:13 - Profile of Salesperson that succeed in Mid-market and Enterprise 22:25 - Sales Hiring in Hypergrowth 27:54 - Remote vs In-person Culture and Performance 40:05 - Investing in the Success of the Sales Team 44:36 - How to think about quotas and compensation 48:59 - Balanced and Thoughtful Growth Plans 54:17 - Lightning Round: Sales as a Super Power, Controversial Advice, Best Fictional Sales Person Are you Hiring Salespeople? Check out Bravado Talent - https://talent.bravado.co/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/wearebravado Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/bravado Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bravado_sales/https:// Bravado.co

Scaling a 72% Win Rate, NOT Forcing Yourself Up Market, Pipeline Over Everything with Jonathan Blackburn, VP Sales at Nooks

You’ve heard how great Revenue Leaders hyper-scaled in the past few years. But, what does it take to do it now - at this moment in the market? In the last 14 months, Jonathan Blackburn, VP of Sales turned a 6 person sales team with no scalable process into 40+ reps and is on his way to making Nooks the fastest growing startup of 2025.  For everyone currently on their own rocketship and looking for contemporary wisdom, find out what Nooks is doing right now to hyper-scale:  - Going against all good Sales advice and winning 72% of the deals that offer the controversial FREE trial!  *gasp  - Reversing the industry norm of pushing up market to instead be pulled up market by strategic processes that build trust   - Capitalizing on their exceptional timing in the market by doubling down on outbound pipeline generation with the best SDR team in the game “Hyper-scale or die” is the battle cry for SaaS in 2025 and Nooks is set to win. Their VP of Sales, Jonathan Blackburn shares all the details of exactly how they’re doing it right now with Bravado CEO Sahil Mansuri.  Episode Content: 00:00 - Introducing Jonathan Blackburn, VP of Sales @ Nooks 03:21 - Expanding the sales team and a 60 day internal evaluation 08:51 - Try before you buy20:32 - Profile of rep to hire at Nooks 30:20 - Red Flags while hiring35:32 - Setting up the team for success 47:07 - Managing up as a VP of Sales54:03 - Pipeline and the resurgence of the SDR 01:01:54 - Sales as a Superpower 01:05:13 - Best advice early in your careerAre you Hiring Salespeople? Are you Hiring Salespeople? Check out Bravado Talent - https://talent.bravado.co/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/wearebravado Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/bravado Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bravado_sales/https:// Bravado.co

Sprinting to $100M ARR, Recruiting a Winning Team, and Building a Successful Remote-First Culture with Stevie Case, CRO @ Vanta

Vanta CRO Stevie Case hyper-scaled her team from 20 people and $10M to 300+ and $100M in less than two years. This week’s episode is a masterclass in how to change the trajectory of your business.  If your company is between $5M - $20M ARR, you’ll hear the cheat codes to  - Moving Upmarket: How to scale to enterprise customers without losing focus on your core SMB base - Culture Building: Going all-in on enablement so your reps can grow their career as far as they want without leaving the company - Remote-First Structuring: How Vanta went against the conventional wisdom and achieved this hypergrowth with a fully remote sales team. The bar for startup growth keeps getting raised. The only way to keep up is to lead the way. Bravado CEO Sahil Mansuri brings you the insights to help you do just that every other Wednesday on The Bravado Pod. Episode Content: 00:00 - Introducing Stevie Case, CRO @ Vanta06:55 - Success comes down to the people you hire. Who does Vanta hire? 23:24 - How to crush a Stevie Case interview - the exercise that makes or breaks it for candidates at Vanta 30:39 - Maximizing Productivity in a Remote-first team and the importance of face time 39:35 - It’s never too early to think about creating multiple revenue engines 49:47 - How to forecast accurately for success with the levers that drive pipeline 57:41 - The real ROI betting on SDRs 1:04:52 - Lightning Round: Sales as a Superpower, Professional Gaming to Sales Are you Hiring Salespeople? Check out Bravado Talent - https://talent.bravado.co/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/wearebravado Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/bravado Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bravado_sales/https:// Bravado.co

Scaling SMB to $30M, Investing in RevOps Early, and Stage-appropriate Sales Hiring with Kyle Norton

Scaling SMB Vertical SaaS Owner.com from $2M to $30M with an Ever Evolving Playbook that Adapts Sales Strategy at Each Milestone: CRO Kyle Norton  The secret to the best Sales Playbook for scaling is that it constantly changes at each step. Kyle Norton took his company from $2M to $30M ARR in just a few years by pivoting the GTM strategy to the challenge at hand. Kyle offers actionable advice for Sales Leaders and Founders in early stages on:  - The people to hire in the beginning vs the people to hire to scale  - Indicators that determine if a $2M company has the potential to reach $30M  - How early investments in RevOps can help you scale faster  - Preparing for setbacks before they happen  You’ll hear everything a Founder needs to know about finding the right Sales Leader to take their startup to the first $30M, and everything that Sales Leader needs to know about getting there from Kyle Norton and Bravado CEO Sahil Mansuri in this episode. Episode Content: 00:00 - Welcome Kyle Norton, CRO at Owner.com 03:20 - Doing hard things helped me be better at Sales 05:07 - Finding a winning company 16:43 - What to look for in a founding team 33:43 - Your first VP of Sales is a bridge 48:44 - You need Pirates and Romantics 58:010 - In office vs remote 1:08:35 - Shoot above your number 1:13:08 - Quick fire round

GTM Benchmarks Post-ARR, The Death of Post-Sales, Investing in Outliers with Sangeeta Chakraborty

From Scaling GTM at Okta, Checkr, and Miro to How AI is Disrupting the SaaS Sales Playbook: CRO Sangeeta Chakraborty  Discover how the AI era is transforming Sales teams, Sales Leadership, and even CS. Drawing from her experience scaling revenue at top SaaS companies during major market disruptions, Sangeeta reveals:  Why traditional SaaS Sales strategies are being upended by AI-driven pricing and customer expectation changes  Battle-tested tactics for breaking into new markets without brand recognition  The most important skills for reps to thrive in the AI era  Strategies for Sales Leaders to meet today’s aggressive revenue targets Bravado CEO, Sahil Mansuri asks the questions Founders, Sales VPs, and AEs need answered to crush quota in 2025. Sangeeta's LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/sangeetachakraborty/ Episode Content: 00:00 - Welcoming Sangeeta Chakraborty to the Podcast! 06:41 - The importance of hiring the right people for Sales 12:12 - The evolution of post-sales in usage based pricing models 15:00 - The new AE role 22:20 - Building a culture of learning 28:34 - Winners don’t shy away from big targets 37:05 - Outlier performance will always lead Sales 38:42 - The right way to plan for outliers 42:28 - TOFU for startups 47:17 - The next phase of brand growth 49:05 - The work most companies try to skip 52:02 - Quick fire round Are you Hiring Salespeople? Check out Bravado Talent - https://talent.bravado.co/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/wearebravado Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/bravado Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bravado_sales/ https://Bravado.co