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Who we sat down with
Chris Degnan is the previous Chief Income Officer of Snowflake, the place he helped scale the corporate from pre-product to over $4B in ARR and greater than $100B in market cap. Over his 11-year tenure, Chris constructed Snowflake’s go-to-market engine from the bottom up, from personally operating the primary outbound campaigns to main a worldwide gross sales group by means of 4 CEOs and one of many largest software program IPOs in historical past.
At this time, he advises founders and income leaders on methods to construct high-velocity GTM groups, rent with grit, and scale with self-discipline. Chris can also be the co-author of Make It Snow, the definitive playbook on Snowflake’s go-to-market journey, co-written with CMO Denise Persson.
Mentioned on this episode
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The early days of Snowflake: promoting a stealth startup with no product
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Methods to rent and determine really self-motivated, gritty gross sales expertise
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The teachings from John McMahon that formed Snowflake’s management DNA
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Methods to construct sales-marketing alignment that truly scales
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The near-death experiences that just about killed Snowflake
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What nice CEOs do in another way, from Muglia to Slootman
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The ability of specializing in new brand acquisition
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The evolution of gross sales methodologies: MEDDPICC, tradition, and curiosity
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The reality about AI’s “bubble”, and what’s actual beneath the hype
Episode highlights
02:21 — Why be part of Snowflake pre-product and in stealth.
05:36 — The unique outreach script and what resonated with prospects.
06:49 — Scaling from lists to SDRs; Degnan’s “8 conferences per week” rule.
09:11 — Hiring for self-starters; the interview opener: “Inform me your life story.”
12:49 — The suggestions loop that saved a CRO in seat for 11 years.
24:46 — The outage that just about killed Snowflake, and the way management confirmed up.
28:34 — New brand gates each quarter and why it mattered greater than something.
34:05 — “Buyer success is everybody’s job”: eradicating CS, monetizing PS, driving adoption.
36:40 — Databricks: the place Snowflake ceded floor and what they’d do in another way.
39:19 — Why going public was the correct transfer for enterprise belief.
Key Takeaways
1. Be the coed of what you promote.
Chris obsessed over mastering Snowflake’s product (from pricing to contracts) and it gave him credibility with each engineers and prospects.
2. Rent for grit, not pedigree.
He realized that big-company gross sales reps usually crumble in startups. Search for individuals who’ve constructed from scratch, not those that’ve inherited playbooks.
3. Gross sales and advertising are one engine.
Snowflake’s progress hinged on alignment between Chris and CMO Denise Persson, measured solely by certified conferences, not MQL vainness metrics.
4. Founders create alignment or chaos.
Should you pit gross sales vs. advertising, you’ve already misplaced. Founders should design the system for shared possession of progress.
5. Buyer success is everybody’s job.
Degnan scrapped CS as a standalone operate, embedding it into gross sales and SEs to drive true accountability for buyer outcomes.
6. Curiosity compounds.
His 11-year CRO tenure (by means of 4 CEOs) was powered by humility, suggestions loops, and relentless curiosity about what labored and why.
7. Urgency is a superpower.
The perfect leaders don’t plan for 3 months from now. They execute at present. Denise Persson’s “let’s do it proper now” mindset formed Snowflake’s tempo.
8. Product-minded CEOs win.
Degnan believes one of the best CEOs are product-first, capable of zoom out strategically whereas diving deep into executional element.
9. Give attention to logos, not simply income.
Early hyperfocus on buyer acquisition created community results, credibility, and the muse for Snowflake’s scale.
10. AI is a bubble with actual roots.
He sees parallels to the dot-com increase: inflated valuations, however lasting infrastructure that may outline the following decade.
Observe Chris Degnan
Advisable books
Referenced
Host hyperlinks
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