From Account Executive to National Sales Manager
Zoe Pappas initially joined Barn2Door in December 2019 as an Account Executive, before eventually being promoted to lead, then manager, and now our National Sales Manager. Over the past 3 ½ years, her career has flourished at Barn2Door, as she has grown professionally as an individual contributor, manager and leader in the business.
Before Zoe’s Career at Barn2door
Prior to Barn2Door, Zoe graduated from UCLA and worked for a fortune 500 company as an aspiring account executive. Living in L.A., working for Farmers wasn’t on her radar. However, she did have a love for sales, and wanted to work for a fast-paced company that gave her freedom to be in charge of her work. After moving to Seattle, she came across an ambitious Ag-Tech startup, Barn2Door, that fit the bill. She was drawn in by the opportunity for professional growth, working closely with management, and uncapped Sales commissions, while serving Farmers.
Zoe believed in the mission to provide Farmers with a platform to sell direct, making their businesses more resilient, and providing more financial upside for their families. Interacting day-to-day with Farmers means she sees the emotions, trials and challenges they must confront. Offering a solution from Barn2Door helps Farmers take control of their own success, relieving the financial struggles and constraints in traditional commodity markets.
Becoming an Account Executive that Serves Farmers
What does Sales Training look like for a new Account Executive?
During the initial 3-months of onboarding, the Sales training process at Barn2Door is well scripted. To develop as an effective Account Executive, individuals must become knowledgeable about Farm businesses, products and practices, in addition to Barn2Door’s own software and services. The Company also utilizes top-tier productivity solutions, which require training, too.
Beyond underlying Product knowledge and Sales processes, Account Executives must also learn the soft skills to become a good business advisor to Farmers.
Month 1: Learning about the industry, the company and managing leads. Farm Business, Farm Practices, Productivity Solutions, Cold Call Assessment.
Month 2: Learning the process of managing a pipeline, discovery and demonstrating the solution. Discovery Playbooks, Competition, Demo Training, Demo Assessment.
Month 3: Building confidence in core Farm use cases and closing deals. Follow-up Playbooks, Closing Training, Closing Assessment.
Learning to identify the pain points for an individual Farm, and uncovering how Barn2Door can offer value is the key to becoming an effective Account Executive. Assessments at every stage during Sales Training provides each new hire with specific and direct feedback to be successful.
What does the day-to-day in Sales look like?
Being a part of the Sales Team means coming into work everyday excited to connect with new Farmers. The goal is to reach out to prospects, learn more about their Farm, explain how Barn2Door can serve their business, and schedule a Demo.
Ideally, Farms will see the benefits of Barn2Door for their business, attracting more customers, selling more products and saving time. When farmers win, we win.
Becoming Barn2Door’s National Sales Manager
At Barn2Door, all of its leaders have grown from within. For Zoe, this has provided tremendous professional growth and development. Within her first year, Zoe was asked to move into a Lead role, where she was initially responsible for 2 Account Executives, while maintaining her own Sales pipeline.
Eventually her role expanded to 2 more Account Executives, and then a full-time Manager role. During the first 6 months as Lead, she grew professionally, taking responsibility for 1-on-1’s, coaching and training. As a Manager, she was responsible for 6 Account Executives, helping to coach and train her team.
In Spring 2023, Zoe was promoted to National Sales Manager, responsible for the entire Sales team. As a manager of managers, her goal is to see the entire Sales team grow as a whole.
Maintaining an environment of motivated people, with individual needs and goals, takes a lot of work. But, the efforts are rewarding. Zoe is continuing to fine tune the training program so every Account Executive feels confident in their abilities.
Recently, Zoe helped to implement Barn2Door’s leveling guidelines for Account Executives to provide a longer term career path from AE I, to AE II and AE III. In addition to Quantitative metrics (Quota, Accelerators and Pipelines), Barn2Door’s leveling guidelines also include a Qualitative assessment to help nurture the attributes of a successful Sales Professional (Productivity, Process, Persuasion, Domain Expertise and Influence).
How to Become Successful in a Sales Role
For those looking for professional growth in a Sales career, Zoe has a few key suggestions:
Coachable. Seek feedback from team members, and use it while working collaboratively.
Internal Motivation. You must be self-motivated to become the best salesperson. Even striving to be 1% better than yesterday.
Be Authentic. Care about the conversation with your Sales prospect and work hard to uncover and solve a pain point.
You can make money selling anything, but when you value your customers and believe in the product, you become more passionate.
Zoe’s favorite Barn2Door core value is Hungry, because she strives to get better everyday. She wants those around her to be a better Salesperson than they were the day before, too.
Conclusion
Over the past 3 ½ years at Barn2Door, Zoe Pappas has had tremendous career growth. Evolving as a senior leader in the business has propelled her professional growth, and helped her grow as a person, too. Zoe is excited to continue to expand and attract more talented individuals to join the Barn2Door Sales team.
If you’re eager to grow your Sales career as an Account Executive at Barn2Door we encourage you to apply online. Learn more about available and open Barn2Door positions here: Barn2Door Careers
Barn2Door provides an all-in-one solution to help Farmers sell direct - online and in-person. If you’re curious to learn why successful Farms run on Barn2Door, watch this 5-minute video.