On May 8, the conference "Sell or Die. How to develop effective sales in a startup." was organized by our fund as part of the ScaleUP support program. The event gathered nearly 180 participants – founders, representatives of startups and investors, who together with us explored the secrets of effective sales in the dynamically changing world of technology.
The "Sell or Die" conference began at 8:30 a.m. with registration, during which participants had the opportunity for the first networking and refreshments. At 9:30 a.m., Wojciech Pysiewicz, the founder of our fund, officially welcomed all guests, and then talked about what has happened in our fund since the last conference in November. And there was quite a lot going on, mentioning for example a new approach to investments or the construction of new structures in three domain areas (fintech, green Energy, impact / tech / AI). In this part, there was also room to distinguish companies that have achieved further milestones in their development in recent months. And so, for joining the "BEP Club", the Blue Hearts of WP2 Investments were awarded to the following companies:
- Sparados
- NaturalAntibody
- GoPay
For the largest growth of the portfolio company, the award went to QUICKO – our payment card publishing company.
On this occasion, we could not fail to mention the exit, which happened literally minutes after our last conference. The award for exiting the WP2 Investments portfolio was given to Wellbee, which was acquired by Benefit Systems.
Congratulations to all the winners!
Then, the ScaleUp Center team presented a set of activities available to companies from our portfolio in areas such as finance and controlling, digital marketing, communication and PR, subsidies and fundraising.
The next item on the agenda was an interactive survey, which engaged participants in a dialogue about their own challenges and sales successes.
Opening speech entitled "BIGOS TIRAMISU IN BBQ SAUCE - HOW (NOT) TO BUILD A "SALES MENU" IN TECH COMPANIES." was presented by Przemysław Simon Stanisz from The Northstar Consulting Group2. His lecture, rich in practical tips and unusual comparisons, provided a fresh look at the process of creating a sales offer.
The second block began at 11:15 a.m. with the panel "Sales challenges in portfolio companies", in which Jacek Sidzina from Suplement.io, Bartłomiej Tuleja from Da Vinci Green Energy, Przemysław Kamiński from Self Learning Solutions and Adam Miziołek from Verestro shared the experiences of their startups in scaling sales. They talked about practical steps on the way to effective sales, how to pivot sales when something does not go as we would like, how to use new technologies in sales and what is most important in conquering new, often distant not only geographically but also culturally, markets. At noon, Bartosz Majewski from Casbeg presented "A few practical observations about sales in startups", offering a valuable look at the specifics of sales at an early stage of company development, supported by his own experience. We learned, among other things, that you don't always have to start with large markets, and that too long a process of rejecting leads to artificial clogging of the pipeline and problems with efficiency.
The first debate of the day was entitled "Building sales in the context of raising capital from investors". The discussion with the participation of Leszek Wolany (Hipets), Krzysztof Drzyzga (Verestro) and Radosław Czyrko (Tar Heel Capital Pathfinder), moderated by Mateusz Grzeszczuk, focused on how sales results affect the attractiveness of a startup for potential investors.
The third block was opened by Damian Winkowski from Leocode, who presented "Technological tools supporting sales". He discussed solutions that can automate and streamline sales processes, which is crucial for scaling in tech companies. He introduced us to Jarvis, who may become a full-fledged CEO in the future, and on the example of the new Corny bar ad, he proved that for the time being, AI is not yet able to come up with some ideas😉.
Next, Piotr Pawłowski from NewSales delved into "The Psychology of Sales – How to Sell in the Language of Pain", showing how a deep understanding of the customer's needs and the problems they face can be a powerful sales tool.
Mariusz Bagan from our WP2 Investments fund asked a fundamental question : "Do numbers sell themselves?", analyzing the importance of data and metrics in the sales process and showing what a good story, supported by numbers, can sound like. The conference was closed by the debate "International sales successes - how to achieve them?". Moderated by Krzysztof Domaradzki from Forbes, the discussion with Maja Schaefer (Zowie), Marta Łącka-Wikło (Quantia) and Martin Markiewicz (Silent Eight) provided inspiring examples and practical tips on expanding into foreign markets served by experienced founders.
We are glad that our conference was once again a platform for the exchange of knowledge and experience, emphasizing the key role of sales in the success of any technology startup. We believe that the meeting allowed the participants not only to gain new knowledge from leading experts, but also to establish valuable business contacts. We would like to thank all speakers, moderators and participants for being part of our event, because it is you who create its atmosphere!
Text prepared with the support of AI tools.
