I Spent 24 Hours With the Sales Team Behind a $300M Startup

章节 1：走进 Letter AI：从创始人主导销售到组建销售团队

📝 本节摘要：

主持人 Payton 飞往芝加哥，参观 AI 原生营收赋能平台 Letter AI。该公司 2023 年成立，10 个月内连续完成两轮融资，从 4 人团队发展到每季度签下数十笔六位数订单。前两年增长主要依靠创始人主导的销售，如今公司正组建一支大多入职仅数周的销售团队。参观当天恰逢季度最后一天，CEO Ali Akhtar 透露本季度已签下十几笔六位数订单。随后团队召开每周管道复盘会，使用的是自家产品 Letter Compass。

[原文] [Payton]: Imagine starting a company and landing customers like before you even have a proper sales team. That's exactly what this startup did.

[译文] [Payton]: 想象一下：你创办了一家公司，还没组建像样的销售团队，就已经拿下了这样的客户。这家初创公司正是这么做到的。

[原文] [Payton]: You quit your job the day Chat GPT came out.

[译文] [Payton]: 你在 ChatGPT 发布当天就辞职了。

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: Yeah.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 没错。

[原文] [Payton]: This is Ali Akhtar, the co-founder and CEO of Letter AI, an AI-native revenue enablement platform. And if you're looking at me and saying, "But Payton, what even is enablement?" I knew you were going to say that. They launched in 2023, raised back-to-back funding rounds within 10 months, and turned a four-person team into one closing dozens of six-figure deals a quarter. And for the first 2 years, most of their growth came from founder-led sales. But founders can only do so much for so long. Now, Letter is in the middle of figuring out what comes next. They're building out a sales team, most of them just weeks into the job, and entering a completely new phase of growth. So I flew to Chicago to spend a day at Letter AI to see how they're actually doing it. It's my first time in Chicago, by the way.

[译文] [Payton]: 这位是 Ali Akhtar，Letter AI 的联合创始人兼 CEO。Letter AI 是一个 AI 原生的营收赋能（revenue enablement）平台。如果你正看着我说：“可是 Payton，赋能到底是啥？”——我就知道你会这么问。他们 2023 年上线，10 个月内连续完成两轮融资，把一个 4 人小团队发展成了每季度能签下几十笔六位数订单的团队。头两年，他们的增长大多来自创始人主导的销售（founder-led sales）。但创始人能做的终究有限，也撑不了太久。如今，Letter 正在摸索下一步怎么走。他们正在组建销售团队，大多数成员才入职几周，公司也进入了一个全新的增长阶段。于是我飞到芝加哥，在 Letter AI 待了一天，看看他们到底是怎么做的。顺便说一句，这是我第一次来芝加哥。

[原文] [Payton]: It looks like— Are you at Letter?

[译文] [Payton]: 看起来像是……你是 Letter 的吗？

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: Yeah.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 对。

[原文] [Payton]: Ah, yes. Nice to meet you. I'm Payton.

[译文] [Payton]: 啊，太好了。很高兴认识你，我是 Payton。

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: Nice to meet you, Payton.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 很高兴认识你，Payton。

[原文] [Payton]: Payton.

[译文] [Payton]: 是 Payton。

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: Oh, Payton, sorry.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 哦，Payton，不好意思。

[原文] [Payton]: All good.

[译文] [Payton]: 没事。

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: Payton. I just woke up. You're going to give me a—

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: Payton。我刚睡醒。你这是要给我来个……

[原文] [Payton]: How's it going?

[译文] [Payton]: 最近怎么样？

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: Isn't it nice to meet you?

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 见到你真高兴，不是吗？

[原文] [Payton]: Are we going all the way up? Is it this floor?

[译文] [Payton]: 我们要一直上到顶楼吗？是这层吗？

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: This floor right here. Yeah.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 就是这层。对。

[原文] [Payton]: Oh my god, it's cool.

[译文] [Payton]: 天哪，好酷。

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: Thank you.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 谢谢。

[原文] [Payton]: Office tour. First impression, I love the industrial look.

[译文] [Payton]: 办公室参观。第一印象：我超爱这种工业风。

[原文] [Payton]: Phone booth. Yeah, this is nice. Every office has to have their neon light-up sign with their company name. It's pretty comfortable. Not going to lie. Let's go see where the people are. Come on. Hi. What's your name?

[译文] [Payton]: 电话亭。嗯，这个不错。每家公司都得有块写着公司名的霓虹灯牌。说实话，还挺舒服的。我们去看看大家都在哪儿。走吧。嗨，你叫什么名字？

[原文] [Charlie]: I'm Charlie.

[译文] [Charlie]: 我是 Charlie。

[原文] [Payton]: Nice to meet you.

[译文] [Payton]: 很高兴认识你。

[原文] [Charlie]: Nice to meet you.

[译文] [Charlie]: 很高兴认识你。

[原文] [Payton]: Payton.

[译文] [Payton]: 我是 Payton。

[原文] [Britney]: Hi.

[译文] [Britney]: 嗨。

[原文] [Payton]: What's your name?

[译文] [Payton]: 你叫什么名字？

[原文] [Britney]: Britney.

[译文] [Britney]: Britney。

[原文] [Payton]: Nice to meet you.

[译文] [Payton]: 很高兴认识你。

[原文] [Britney]: Nice to meet you.

[译文] [Britney]: 很高兴认识你。

[原文] [Payton]: Meet you.

[译文] [Payton]: 认识你。

[原文] [Payton]: Payton.

[译文] [Payton]: 我是 Payton。

[原文] [Britney]: You got—

[译文] [Britney]: 你……

[原文] [Payton]: Payton. And by the end of the night, me and the team became pretty close.

[译文] [Payton]: Payton。到了晚上，我和这个团队已经混得挺熟了。

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: Today is a very packed day.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 今天的安排非常满。

[原文] [Payton]: Okay.

[译文] [Payton]: 好的。

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: End of quarter for us today. A lot of activity happening. It's going to be an action-packed day.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 今天是我们这个季度的最后一天，事情特别多，会是非常忙碌的一天。

[原文] [Payton]: Sweet. Last day of the quarter, how are you feeling for how you did in Q1?

[译文] [Payton]: 好啊。季度最后一天了，你觉得第一季度表现得怎么样？

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: You know, I always feel like I left a little bit out there. You know, there was one large deal that slipped, but that happens in sales. So, you know, we'll wake up tomorrow, grab a coffee, and focus on how we can get that in the next few weeks.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 你知道，我总觉得还有些没拿到手。有一笔大单滑走了，不过做销售这种事难免。所以，明天醒来喝杯咖啡，然后专心琢磨怎么在接下来几周把它拿下。

[原文] [Payton]: I'm just dead. I'm dead weight at this point.

[译文] [Payton]: 我已经累瘫了，现在完全是个累赘。

[原文] [Payton]: How many like six-figure deals did you guys close this quarter?

[译文] [Payton]: 你们这个季度大概签了多少笔六位数的订单？

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: Great question. It's north of a dozen, and then I'm hoping a few more big ones will be coming in right at the finish line today.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 好问题。超过十几笔了，而且我希望今天在最后关头还能再进来几笔大单。

[原文] [Payton]: Wow. North of a dozen six-figure deals and 30 to 40 total deals a quarter from a team that's barely ramped. Eric and Ben in their first week, Arley and Jacob five weeks in, Lucas four months. Most of them brand spanking new. Which made me curious, how is such a small, brand new team doing that? Luckily, first thing on the agenda was their weekly pipeline review, where the whole team gets together to go over every deal in the works.

[译文] [Payton]: 哇。一个几乎还没完全上手的团队，每季度签下十几笔六位数订单、总共 30 到 40 笔交易。Eric 和 Ben 刚入职第一周，Arley 和 Jacob 入职五周，Lucas 四个月，大多数人都是彻头彻尾的新人。这让我很好奇：这么小、这么新的团队是怎么做到的？幸运的是，今天的第一项议程就是他们的每周管道复盘会（pipeline review），全队聚在一起，把每一笔在谈的单子都过一遍。

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: All right. So, last day of the quarter, pipeline review. So,

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 好了。季度最后一天，管道复盘会。那么，

[原文] [Ali Akhtar]: we run all of our pipeline reviews out of our own product, Letter Compass.

[译文] [Ali Akhtar]: 我们所有的管道复盘会都是用自家产品 Letter Compass 来开的。