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Sr. Growth Marketer

Growth Marketing Lead

RevGenius

Member

Sendoso

Commercial Account Executive

🏅 Milestones:
⚡️ Worked directly with Founder and CEO to create strategic outbound motions
⚡️ Built strategic relationships with VCs and Board to sell into portfolio accounts
⚡️ Created and published SEO content with Demand Gen team
⚡️ Built and scaled strategies that drove $500K+ in pipeline
⚡️ Ghostwrote LinkedIn messaging for leadership

Strategic Account Executive

🏅 Milestones:
⚡️ Lead Q4 21 in closed revenue with over $100K
⚡️ Consistent top 3 performance with 100-120% quota attainment
⚡️ Member of Content Committee building outbound sequences and sales copy

Enterprise Sales Development Representative

AppZen

🏅 Milestones:
⚡️ 124% quota in Q3 20, 100% quota in Q4 20, 125% quota in Q1 21, 130% quota in Q2 21
⚡️ Added over $1 million in new sales opportunities to pipeline
⚡️ Top lead generation with 100 - 500 new contacts per event

Business Development Representative

Aerotek

🏅 Milestones:
⚡️ Accomplished yearly goal of $12K average weekly revenue in 6 months
⚡️ Member of leadership committee on path to be promoted to Account Manager
⚡️ Managed largest client account and first payroll account for construction team

Recruiter

I started out making 50+ dials a day on a physical telephone to recruit candidates for construction contracting roles.

Then I made my way to tech and started writing about what I was learning as an SDR. 

I was eventually selected for Nooks + RevGenius first cold calling competition and saw that outbound was about to change forever. 

Now, I run Nooks’ content and events and I love building our SDR and Sales Leadership community.

Connect with me and follow Nooks to join the fastest growing AI-Parallel Dialer and our group of next generation sales reps ☎️🔥

"How did you go from SDR to Marketing?" 

Five months in San Francisco has exposed me to more people in tech than five years of working from home in Arizona combined.

And I get asked this question all the time. 

In my opinion, SDR -> Marketing should be a normal career path. Think about it: 

As an SDR you learn:
- Where good leads come from
- How to convert them into pipeline
- How to test messaging in real time
- How to understand a customer’s pain quickly
- How to get rejected 100 times a day and still come back

That’s literally growth marketing.

The difference is just the medium, not the muscle (so many are already making content anyways).

Most SDRs would thrive in growth if they realized their job has already been training them for it.

Normalize the SDR to Marketing career path ✌️


---

P.S. - If you're interested in learning how to build a portfolio to get recruited into marketing or land your first marketing role. HMU. 

It's my favorite thing to talk about lately 💜

Giano Fiore

Growth Marketing Manager @ Nooks | Founding Growth Leader

If you’re not thinking about how to promote your best people…
 They’ll promote themselves by getting a job somewhere else.

That’s why I admire our SDR Leader, Melanie Smith.

She built Nooks SDR team from 3 reps to 30.
And promoted 9 of them. 

→ In only 1 year and 8 months. 

Thanks to her, we have top-tier talent in our AE and CSM teams.
 And a constant flow of new applicants and referrals for the SDR team.

There’s no high-performer handcuffs when you’re on her team. 
Only growth. Be like Melanie Smith. 

----

Melanie is the best team builder I’ve met in my career.
And she just recorded a podcast with 30 Minutes to President's Club.

Can’t wait for it to drop. Stay tuned 👀

💜

Are you on a clear path to promotion or are you rolling the dice? ↓

Start-ups aren’t for everyone.
 You have to deal with change constantly.
  And carry way more weight than your title says.


But if you’re built for it, there’s a lot to be grateful for:

1. You get to punch above your weight

At a startup you own the whole revenue story. 
 You learn more in one year than most do in five.  

2. You can see your impact instantly

When you launch something, you feel the results. 
 You push something and the company moves.

3. You work with builders, not bureaucrats

Your ideas matter because you own your discipline.
 It forces you to think independently, and grow fast.

4. You become extremely employable

You operate under pressure. Build without playbooks. 
You become more adaptable in any future role.

5. You get growth stories that others don’t

The “I built this and it became 50% of revenue” stories. 
 These become your portfolio, your personality, your edge.


Tomorrow’s Thanksgiving. Unplug. Enjoy your people.
 Be grateful you chose the hard path, it’s the one that makes you better.

💜


— 

Are you in a Founding role or new to start-ups?
You’re not alone. I got 30+ messages from my last post. 

HMU if you’re interested in early stage roles and career growth. 
It might be the start of a new community.

Giano Fiore 💜

I took a 20% pay cut to land my first Marketing role at Nooks.
 For my entire first year, I made less than I did as an SDR.

At the time, all I really had was:
 – A few years of Sales experience
 – My personal brand and LinkedIn content
 – A portfolio of Upwork projects I did for dirt cheap. 

Most of my friends thought I was crazy. 

But here’s what I knew:
– I wanted to be early in building something great.
– I truly believed in the mission and the product–market fit.
– I was freelancing in marketing and my passion was growing fast.

After weeks of interview projects and convincing them to take a chance on me,
 I got the job as the 15th hire and the first marketer.

And it has completely changed my life. 


→ Short-term dollars and shiny titles are a vanity metric.

If you believe in yourself, bet on yourself.
 Take the risk. Go all in.

✌️

—---

If you’re interested in Founding Marketing and Early Stage roles, HMU. 
 It’s my favorite thing to talk about.

If you wish there was an community for people like you. 
 Then just build one. No excuses. 

That’s what Anastasia Chihai did in Austin. 
 And I watched her do it from scratch. 


Anastasia (left) started ATX SDR Leaders after a couple happy hours in Austin. 

She made her first connections, like the (wonderful) Priyanka Venkat (right). 

And turned that into her own self-produced meet-ups. 


Then it grew. 

From 10
To 20 
To 30 

When Peter Mollins and I attended last year, we saw 50+ SDR Leaders in one room.


Now Anastasia has a community of 30-50 SDR Leaders that join every month for meet-ups in Austin. And multiple sponsors. 

They talk about tech stack, outreach strategy, training, leadership and most importantly - they've all become friends. 



She didn’t wait for someone to build a community that she wanted to join. 

She just did it herself. 

Be like Anastasia. 


— 

BTW - ATX SDR Leaders Holiday Special holiday special is tonight.

If you’re in Austin and you’re reading this, you have to go. 

You’ll be so happy you did (free drinks). 

 Register here: https://luma.com/kpnwezu4

It blows my mind that I get to meet and partner with some of my heroes that I studied when I started as an SDR. 

So I was especially stoked when I got to partner with Kyle Asay on this playbook.


Kyle, VP of Global Growth Sales at LaunchDarkly started with Nooks this year and the results his team produced are wild:

→ 142% increase in outbound pipeline in 3 months
→ 40% higher revenue per AE in 6 months
→ 114% of global revenue target in 9 months


Here are the 3 frameworks Kyle used to unlock that growth (and that any outbound team can steal):


1. Bucket Your Buyers

Instead of random call lists, reps grouped prospects by industry + level + title and ran focused call blocks.

Result: better talk tracks, less context switching, and massive jumps in conversion.


2. Dig for Gold

Not every cold call is about booking a meeting.

Sometimes it’s about extracting insider intel you can use higher in the account.

Those “failed” calls became the fuel for their best executive openers.


3. Lead With Problems, Not Product

When you open with what you sell, you only hit the ~3% of the market actively buying.

When you open with the problem, your relevance jumps to 40%+ of your ICP.

Proud of this one and even prouder of the teams who prove that outbound, when done right, is still one of the highest-leverage growth engines in B2B.


Grab his playbook for free here: https://lnkd.in/gW4SSnu5


—---

P.S. - Here’s a few of my other SDR Heroes that I’ve been reading since 2020: 
🔥 Tom Slocum 
Jared Robin 
Morgan J Ingram 
Mike Gallardo 
zoë hartsfield 
Kyle Coleman 
Devin Reed 
Sarah Brazier
Ronen R. Pessar

2 meetings booked in a day used to be a big deal.
 But now, reps are dropping 4+ in one hour.. 

Here’s what I learned from listening to them during Nooks Cold Call Competitions ↓

 
The reps: 

• Elsie Triana - 6 meetings booked in SPANISH
  
• Lindsey Lesher - 6 meetings booked (2x winner)
  
• Andrew Mullen - 5 meetings booked (2x winner)
  
• Ariel Reed - 5 meetings booked (the first to do it)
  
• Giuliana Ferreira - 5 meetings booked 
  
• Julian Quinlan - 4 meetings booked 
 
• Rachael Mills - 4 meetings booked  

The lessons: 

𝟭. 𝗣𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗮𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗜𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗹 𝗣𝗲𝗿𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗲

The best reps didn’t wing it. They came in with tight lead lists, personalized angles, and a game plan. Then accomplished more in one hour than most do in a day. 


𝟮. 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗩𝗼𝗶𝗰𝗲 𝗦𝗲𝗹𝗹𝘀 𝗕𝗲𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗦𝗰𝗿𝗶𝗽𝘁 𝗗𝗼𝗲𝘀

Every top performer had this calm, certain, friendly tone. Not pushy. Not apologetic. Just human. Prospects don’t just hear your pitch, they feel your energy.


𝟯. 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝘂𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗺𝗼𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘂𝗺

When everyone is calling at the same time and there’s something real on the line - you get focus, urgency, and output you’ll never see on a normal Tuesday afternoon.


𝟰. 𝗘𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗲 𝗠𝗮𝗻𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗖𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗘𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗲 𝗠𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀

Every high output moment had a coach behind it. Someone setting targets, keeping energy high, and giving real-time feedback. Blade Cruickshank built an incredible culture and two of his reps are on this list. 


𝟱. 𝗔𝗜 𝗜𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗡𝗲𝘄 𝗦𝗗𝗥 𝗦𝘂𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗽𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿

AI is becoming the second brain for top reps. The ones who embrace tools like Nooks are smoking the reps of the past. 


—

Join our community of cracked SDRs by following the Nooks page.
 Our 50+ Meeting Club is coming up for Q4 and it's going to be huge. 
 
P.S. - Thanks zoë hartsfield for hosting one of our OG battles for 500+ live viewers👇

Anyone who's unhappy with their career growth should push their way into an early stage start-up.

I'm talking first 30 hires. 


Here’s why.

Early startups have more work than people. 
So you get a chance to work on everything. 

You naturally gravitate toward what you’re good at. 
Because you won’t have to wait for permission.

Then you get to completely own that thing. 


So many examples of this: 

• Ariel and Adrian joined Nooks early and found their true calling as CSMs. 
  
• Ryan and Jared joined early and grew into top AEs. 
  
• I recently met Livia, who joined Tofu and discovered her path in marketing. 
  
• Many of my friends joined Apollo and Gong early and are now building their own businesses.


There are countless early-stage startups looking for smart, hungry people. 

Founding roles are everywhere and wildly underrated.


Sacrifice short-term stability for a real shot at finding your true calling ✌️


---

P.S. - Nooks is growing fast but we haven't lost our start-up spirit. 

Check out our open roles: https://lnkd.in/gVENsVJC

In 2023, I was told that Marketing is dead and I would be replaced by AI. 

In 2024, I was told that AI won't replace me, someone using AI will. 

In 2025, I've been told that human creativity is the only way to stand out from AI slop. 


Now I get ads for creative writing and copy courses for marketers to stand out from the noise. 

And I recently saw a 'hot take' from a CEO that said they only hire pre-ChatGPT grads with creative writing skills. 


So congrats everyone, we did it. 

We have enough hot takes. 

Every hot take has officially been shared. 

We did it. 


--- 


Nooks has always held the position that the art behind Sales and Marketing belongs to humans. 


So if you're a human and a marketer, we're hiring: 

• ABM Lead: https://lnkd.in/gd6NZ-6Z

• Growth Marketing Lead: https://lnkd.in/gEBXDXKP
  

DM me for more info!


Here's a cool pic of us 👇

Come hang out with us, OpenAI and Vapi on Thursday!

Join us at our SF office next week for a discussion on the future of voice AI & audio intelligence for modern AI applications.

We're excited to host Chenguang Zhu who's leading speech research for OpenAI and ChatGPT. 

And Jordan D., Founder/CEO of Vapi, one of the sharpest builders in voice AI. 


There's going to be dozens of the smartest engineers and coolest tech people there. So if you're in SF to network (like me), I'll see you there! 

Register here: https://luma.com/zruc12sr

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