How Yelp’s 600+ Salespeople Sell [Video Interview]

December 18th, 2012 by Sean Black 8 Comments

Yelp was recently ranked one of the top 26 startups to sell for, so we thought we would sit down with their fearless leader and Director of Sales Kayti Sullivan to find out what makes Yelp’s sales team so great and find out everything you ever wanted to know about how Yelp sells. Here are just a few things you will see/learn in this short 3 minute video interview:

Yelp’s sales culture via a tour of their New York office
What Yelp sells
Who Yelp sells to
How Yelp generates leads
How many calls a day each salesperson makes
How many sales presentations/demos a month each salesperson does
Average number of deals closed per salesperson per month
Average revenue per sale (ARPU)
Average contract length
Annual quota per salesperson

8 Responses to “How Yelp’s 600+ Salespeople Sell [Video Interview]”

Mike Onghai says:

December 19, 2012 at 9:02 am

Thanks for the video! I did not get the ARPU details and the other stats as mentioned in the description. Is there a longer version of this video?

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- Sean Black says:
  
  December 19, 2012 at 10:05 am
  
  She talks about average deal size around minute 3:02 Mike
  
  Reply
Jeremy says:

December 19, 2012 at 9:56 am

I am not really sure what the point of the video was. In many ways it was an advertisement for yelp. I was looking for specific information on sales process and techniques. What I saw in the video was pretty much exactly what could have concluded myself without even watching the video.

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- Sean Black says:
  
  December 19, 2012 at 10:04 am
  
  Thanks Jeremy, I agree that the first part of the video is background on what Yelp sells and to whom might feel like a Yelp ad. It is not obvious to everyone what Yelp sells. But the more interesting part is the second half, which highlights the part of the process the Yelp salespeople are responsible for before handing it off, how many calls they do each day, the number of demos they do each month, the average deal size and length. Those metrics are incredibly valuable as a benchmark for companies trying to scale inside sales teams.
  
  Reply
  - Kevin says:
    
    December 19, 2012 at 12:32 pm
    
    Hey Sean,
    AS the others mentioned, I hear 30 presentations a mo, 3-12K deal size, but without a closing average still no way to extrapolate an average yearly sales or quota number. Any insights here? Specifically:
    Average Quota
    Closing average
    Using Crunch for all 30 presentations a mo?
    Thanks
    
    Reply
Robb Stark says:

December 19, 2012 at 12:29 pm

Thanks for the interview, I have to say you did not drill down deep enough to answer the premise of the description of this video “what makes Yelps sales team so great”. What she oultines, and smartly so, is a generic sales process all well know about. Watching Boileroom will teach you the same. There is nothing about what makes them great in this video.

Your topic is interesting and if you continue to pursue the area of sales I would suggest you help us by asking more direct questions about the secret sauce.

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Rich Rosen says:

December 20, 2012 at 3:30 pm

Great interview. Thanks!

Rich Rosen, CEO
FastCall

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Mike Pierce says:

February 6, 2013 at 8:06 pm

Thanks for putting together the video!

2-questions came up after watching.

1…80 calls to 8 presentations to maybe 2 sign ups. Does this flow seem reasonable? I’m guessing this is the call flow based on this video and other posts I’ve read.

2…any stats available on the average presentation they give? Number of slides, amount of engagement, etc?

Thanks,

Mike Pierce

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